litha secures R500m to expand affordable fibre across township economies
The company, which formally launched its network in Mthatha this week, said it has connected homes across 27 communities in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal over the past 18 months.
The expansion comes as competition in South Africa’s affordable fibre market increases, with providers targeting lower-income and historically underserved communities.
Ilitha CEO Vuyani Jarana said the company’s experience had shown that price was only one factor influencing whether households adopt and continue using broadband.
“While affordability is key, the internet use case has a big effect on adoption and usage,” Jarana said. “What drives usage and adoption is the sense of value.”
The company has therefore sought to build services around how customers use connectivity, including partnerships aimed at providing access to healthcare and education services.
At its Mthatha launch, Ilitha showcased TruMD, a digital healthcare platform offering online consultations with HPCSA-registered doctors, as well as its partnership with SpecCon, which provides accredited learnerships, short courses and qualifications.
Different communities, different network economics
Ilitha said its rollout experience has also highlighted differences in the economics of deploying fibre between established townships and more dispersed, self-built settlements.
Higher housing density can make it easier to reach multiple households in established townships, while larger properties and different settlement patterns can increase the cost of connecting homes in other communities.
The company uses a prepaid, uncapped model and offers packages with advertised capacity of between 200Mbps and 300Mbps. It also provides connectivity beyond individual homes in communities where its network is available.
Jarana said the company's approach had been shaped by starting its rollout in township and peri-urban communities rather than adapting an existing urban network model to those markets.
“We didn't start by building a conventional network in an established urban neighbourhood and then ask how to make it work in townships,” he said. “We started in these communities, and our model has been shaped by what we have learnt on the ground about how people live and use connectivity.”
The R500m funding will now be used to take that model into more communities.
“We have spent the past 18 months proving that this model works. The next phase is about taking what we have learnt and scaling it responsibly,” Jarana said.
