The GSMA Handset Affordability Coalition — comprising six of the biggest cell operators in Africa — on Tuesday introduced that six nations on the continent have been earmarked for the launch of its low-cost gadget priced at simply US$40 (R660).
The announcement was made throughout a press convention on the African Pavilion stand at Cellular World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Spain, and coincided with a celebration marking the primary time African cell operators had exhibition area on the MWC flooring.
“One of many largest limitations and challenges for Africa is across the affordability of units. This presents itself within the willingness of our inhabitants to go surfing, just because they can’t discover content material in their very own languages. For us, the problem is round closing the utilization hole by bringing units at an reasonably priced minimal specs on 4G into the pilot section,” mentioned Angela Wamola, head of Africa at GSMA.
The GSMA Handset Affordability Coalition contains Airtel, Axian Telecom, Ethio Telecom, Orange, and South Africa’s Vodacom Group and MTN Group. Two of those operators, specifically MTN and Ethio Telecom, had been exhibitors on the African Pavilion alongside fibre operator Cassava Applied sciences and Tanzanian cell operator Yas. The coalition’s essential purpose is to slim the utilization hole throughout the continent, the place as much as 85% of the inhabitants has entry to cell community protection however far fewer truly make use of it as a result of they can’t afford 4G-capable units.
Wamola mentioned the coalition shared its minimal specs round storage, display dimension, battery life and different options with authentic tools producers with a view to bringing a $40 gadget to market. The coalition acquired “a optimistic response from its vendor ecosystem”, she added.
Six markets
The Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda would be the first to pilot the brand new units. Wamola mentioned negotiations with distributors in these nations have led to guarantees the units will retail at $40. “Many different nations have proven curiosity whereas we’ve been right here in Barcelona,” mentioned Wamola.
A part of the GSMA’s work in bringing reasonably priced units to market entails lobbying regulators to make sure taxes on smartphones don’t inhibit affordability. Wamola cited South Africa for example, the place — following a profitable foyer spearheaded by communications minister Solly Malatsi alongside the cell operators — nationwide treasury in March 2025 introduced the removing of luxurious taxes on smartphones costing R2 500 or much less, resulting in an general decline in costs. Wamola urged regulators in different components of Africa to contemplate related actions to make smartphones extra reasonably priced for his or her populations.
Learn: Smartphone affordability: South Africa’s new financial divide
A serious driver of the coalition’s push for larger connectivity charges throughout the continent is the widening digital literacy hole between African populations and their world counterparts, exacerbated by the rise of AI. Within the developed world, larger charges of fibre connectivity assist the expansion of higher-bandwidth use circumstances supported by AI. These, in flip, result in the event of recent services.
Fibre penetration charges are a lot decrease in Africa whereas cell operators have reached excessive ranges of protection. In accordance with Frehiwot Tamiru, CEO of Ethio Telecom, this places cell operators in a novel place to be the drivers of digital inclusion within the age of AI, however some milestones must be reached first.
“Particular to Africa, to additional unlock entry to digital companies in addition to AI potential, we’ve to deal with the affordability problem,” mentioned Tamiru.
The announcement of the reasonably priced gadget pilot coincides with the launch and stay demonstration of the primary open Swahili reasoning mannequin, inbuilt collaboration with MeetKai Zambia. The mannequin is able to translating on-line content material to Swahili.
Chatting with TechCentral in a post-launch interview, Wamola mentioned the AI language initiative is meant to deal with one other subject plaguing African nations: customers not having sufficient content material related to them in their very own languages. She mentioned that is one other contributor to the excessive utilization hole even the place connectivity is available.
Regardless of being optimistic that the $40 value level will make connectivity extra reasonably priced for a lot of throughout Africa, she admitted that the present RAM scarcity, which has led to a rise within the value of shopper units, is a threat in the long run. The coalition’s final purpose is to carry the worth down so far as $20/unit.
Learn: Smartphone market hit by deepening reminiscence disaster
“With the reminiscence scarcity, the $40 value level may slip away. Costs are actually escalating, although distributors have dedicated to doing their finest to carry the units at that value level. We want this to get began as a result of the momentum will carry us scale and that scale will assist us get to that $20 value level,” mentioned Wamola. — (c) 2026 NewsCentral Media
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