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Zimbabwean businessman and investor Edd Branson has entered the mobile telecommunications space with a US$100 million fund to buy equity in African GSM operators.
Branson and his consortium are eyeing a controlling stake with 3 bullish bids on African GSM operators.
Documents obtained revealed that Branson had placed a combined US$30 million bid for a leveraged buyout on embattled GSM operators in Gambia, Benin and Chad with the deals now at different stages.
Branson is leading a consortium of investors under the New York based Afri-USA Business Initiative.
The African mobile network space is dominated by six players namely Vodacom, Telefonica, Airtel, Orange and Beeline which are not indigenous African companies and MTN is the only indigenous giant in the GSM space worth US$13 billion.
An insider revealed that Branson’s consortium had major interests in Benin’s telecom market which continues to be restricted by the poor condition of the country’s fixed-line infrastructure, and the consortium had deployed funds for Benin’s fibre infrastructure development.
“Chad was on their radar with a memorandum of private placement already received. Chad’s telecommunications market is still developing.
“Penetration rates in all telephone market sectors are at 40.2 percent and Internet at 18 percent.”
Chad’s mobile sector is growing fast because of competition between two foreign-owned networks – Bharti Airtel (formerly Zain), and Millicom which was sold to Morocco Telecom in 2019 (Tigo).
The national telecom and fixed-line operator, Sotel Tchad, operates the country’s third mobile network. The mobile networks offer basic mobile data services using GPRS and EDGE technology as well as 3G/4G the entry of Branson and his consortium into the market would be a game changer.
In Gambia the consortium has identified an embattled entity with talks of the consortium taking over a 49 percent stake in the company already at advanced stages.
The Afri-USA Business Initiative has pulled major resources towards the mobile telecommunications space with hedge funds and an investment bank contributing to the US$100 million war chest mobilised by Branson.
Online Reporter