South Africa will soon have the entire population covered on the telecommunications sector. Latest data shows that 98.5% of the South African population is subscribed to one of the four mobile network operators. Annual growth stands at 10.7%, which is a decrease from the 22.5% recorded a year ago. Many consumers have multiple subscriptions to network, which means that the data won’t be exact.

Vodacom continues to reign the market with 22.16m consumers which is decreasing, unlike its rival MTN which stands at 15.56m, while Cell C has 5.4m subscribers.

MTN this week unveiled a new form of SIM swap which is self-serviced. The consumer who loses his/her SIM card, or whose phone is stolen simply buys a new SIM card at any outlet, and phones 173 and requests the SIM swap. The same amount of airtime, the same number, and the same subscriptions will be maintained. The package is only available to Pay As You Go consumers (prepaid). More information in the press release after the break.

[via Cellular-News, MTN]

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T-Mobile is all set to launch a new service that will make photo sharing even more accurate and interactive. It’s not a accessory nor a phone, but it’s a high resolution digital picture frame with a SIM card and its own phone number.

Cameo will enable consumers to send a snap to picture frame via MMS from their phone, and the shared picture will pop-up at the picture frame’s display.

Below are the specifications of picture frame:

• High-resolution digital TFT screen with 720 x 480 pixels
• Displays photos with 262 144 colours
• Display dimensions: 130 x 87 mm
• Connections:
  • GPRS Class 10 (dual band) for transferring photos from a phone
  • Mini USB port (for transferring photos from a PC)
  • SD/MMC card slot (for transferring photos directly from a camera)
• Receives MMS messages
• Photo format: JPEG and GIF
• Stores up to 500 photos
• Automatically adapts the picture size to the screen
• Brightness adjustment
• Automatically rotates the picture (portrait/landscape)
• Adjustable backlight (manual or automatic)
• External frame with an interchangeable leather surround
• Memory cards accepted:
  SD, miniSD (with adapter), microSD (with adapter), MMC, RS-MMC (with adapter), MMC plus, MMC mobile (with adapter), MMC micro (with adapter), SDHC, mini SDHC (with adapter).

The picture frame will cost $100 and service charge will be $10 per month.

[via cellphonesignal]

Samsung has introduced the slim Sway U650 mobile phone for the Verizon Wireless network. The phone can be used on the V CAST Music with Rhapsody, where 5m tracks are available for download to a PC and then transfer to the phone, or any other device, as the tracks won’t have DRM restrictions.

Sway will pack a 2 megapixel camera, Bluetooth, microSD memory card support, a 2.2″ display, Mobile Web, and Media Centre capabilities. The device comes in a silver colour with a slider form factor. Verizon Wireless has priced the Sway to be available for $69.99 after a $50 mail-in rebate with a new two-year customer agreement.

I am not acquainted with the V CAST Music with Rhapsody system, and how it exactly works, but I’m sure our readers from the US, or our Senior Analyst, Chris, can explain to us in a comment. Even if the system allows free downloads, it will be far from Nokia’s Comes with Music as the downloads have to be conducted on a PC, and then transferred onto a phone.

Press release and images after the break.

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Reuters reported last week that Germany’s governing body will hold auctions for new 3G licenses, allowing new carriers to bid alongside Germany’s four major carriers for new bandwidth in the ~1800MHz and ~2600MHz spectrum. This is great news for Germany, German mobile communications, and other carriers looking to enter the German market! Germany will be allowing more competition to influence pricing. More of the population will have more access to mobile broadband. Carriers experiencing capacity limitations or lacking coverage in the traditional 900MHz and 1800MHz frequencies can acquire bandwidth to alleviate network issues. International or fledgling carriers can seek opportunity by investing in bandwidth to get a figurative foot in the door of the marketplace.
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The long-awaited Apple iPhone 3G has reached the Southern tip of Africa thanks to Vodacom, on last week Friday. The phone will be available to both prepaid and contract consumers, and for the latter, the operator has created special tariffs dedicated to the iPhone which offers SMS, inclusive minutes, and data.

The iPhone 3G will be available at R6389.00 for the 8GB version, and R7569.00 for the 16GB version, if bought on prepaid. On contract, the phone will cost anywhere from R1,799 to R2,189 for the 8GB version, and from R2,899 to R3,299 for the 16GB version.

There will be three contracts: Plan 120s, 240, and 500s, where the number stands for the number of inclusive minutes freely available. All contracts will contain 100 free SMS, and 250MB of data, which is quite poor considering most of urbanized South Africa is covered by HSDPA. Out of bundle data rate is R1.50 per MB.

Press release after the break.

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