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07** Phone Numbers Run Out, Kenyans to get New Phone Numbers

BY Soko Directory Team · May 1, 2019 07:05 am

Kenyans will soon get new mobile numbers after telecommunications service providers exhausted the traditional ‘07’ prefix.

Two largest service providers, Safaricom and Airtel have applied to the Communication Authority for permission to roll out new lines that will start with 0110, 0111 and 0100, 0101, 0102 respectively.

According to sources from both Safaricom and Airtel, Safaricom is set to roll out two million new numbers while Airtel will be expected to roll out three million new lines.

Telkom Kenya is yet to apply for the new roll out with sources indicating that the telco is awaiting its proposal for the merger with Airtel.

According to stats by the Communications Authority (CA), more than 100 million lines under the 07 prefix have been issued so far and all of them have been exhausted.

Data from the regulator’s latest statistics indicate that the number of mobile phone subscribers stood at 49 million as of December last year. However, almost a third of Kenyans have multiple SIM cards thus pushing mobile penetration in the country past the 100 percent mark.

At the same time, more than 50 million SIM cards have been taken up by SIM-card enabled gadgets such as modems and smart home devices.

Such connected devices – popularly categorized under the Internet of Things (IoT) – create a network link that allows for their automation and remote access.

Source: The Standard Digital

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