Safaricom, Kenya’s largest mobile operator, has received regulatory approval from the Competition Authority of Kenya (CAK) and the Capital Markets Authority (CMA) of Kenya to acquire assets of Essar Telecommunications Kenya Limited.

 “I am confident that our customers in both urban and rural areas will benefit from the anticipated improvement of the quality of service on both voice and data services as we switch on more of the acquired capacity,” said Bob Collymore, CEO of Safaricom. 

Collymore however said in an interview with Business Daily that most of YuMobile’s workers will be absorbed Safaricom.

The assets – YuMobile’s infrastructure and frequency spectrum – are valued at Shs 7.2 billion ($80 million). This excludes its 2.7 million customers, which will be swallowed up by Airtel as part of a combined acquisition deal with Safaricom.

The deal has been described as one of the largest in Kenya’s telecom sector.

Essar decided to sell its YuMobile business after it made annual losses totalling Sh3 billion ($33.5 million). Since it was launched in 2008, YuMobile has been unable to break-even. It has had to rely on its parent company Essar to keep the business afloat.

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