Find Telecommunication expertise in Uganda

A survey of telecoms in Uganda shows that there are 5 main telephone lines, 270 mobile phone subscribers and 79 internet users for every 1,000 people (2008).

The Uganda Communications Act 1997 was passed in order to open the telecoms sector up to private investment. Prior to this, poor infrastructure held back sector-wide development and investment.

Following the liberalisation of the telecoms sector, private company Mobile Telephone Networks (MTN) and Uganda Telecom Limited (UTL) became the national telecom operators providing a range of telecom services, including fixed telephony and mobile phone services, as well as internet and broadband. Zain Uganda is a leading provider of mobile phone services. The main internet service providers are MTN, UTL, Infocom, Africa Online and Datanet.

Being landlocked, the country depended entirely on satellites for its international connectivity until 2009 when several international submarine fibre optic cables landed on the African east coast. Uganda is now connected via a national fibre backbone extending to its borders with neighbouring coastal countries. By 2013, prices for international bandwidth had fallen to a fraction of their original cost, but retail pricing of broadband services is still relatively expensive, especially when considering purchasing power parity. However, wireless and mobile technologies such as WiMAX, EV-DO, HSPA and LTE are now putting the internet within reach of a much wider part of the population than traditional fixed-line DSL services have in the past. These improvements in infrastructure are revolutionising the market and enabling converged voice, data and digital media services.