A new report puts South Africa\u2019s smartphone users at 20 million, showing growth of 32% in 2013.<\/p>\n
The report, compiled by venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), warns that smartphone growth in the country will slow to 27% in 2014.<\/p>\n
The report, delivered by Mary Meeker, an American venture capitalist and former Wall Street securities analyst, said that SA’s internet penetration was at 20 million in 2013, having grown 20%.<\/p>\n
Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx, believes that the data is flawed for South Africa, and is based on well-known flawed data which uses the adult population as the base.<\/p>\n
He said that it inflates the numbers by as much as 50%.<\/p>\n
MTN recently noted that the number of \u00a0smartphones on its network in SA increased by 32.6% to 7.3 million, while Vodacom said that its has\u00a07.3 million smartphones active on its network in SA.<\/p>\n
While South Africa’s third operator Cell C put its total subscriber base beyond 16 million, it is unclear how many of its subscribers use a smartphone.<\/p>\n
According to market research firm GfK, in\u00a0March 2014, more smartphones were sold in South Africa than feature phones for the first time ever.<\/p>\n
From an internet perspective, in July, research conducted by the Digital Media and Marketing Association (DMMA<\/a>) and Echo Consultancy<\/a> estimated total internet population in South Africa in 2013 to be almost 14 million users.<\/p>\n The report found that global internet user growth has slowed to 9% in 2013, against 11% in 2012, while smartphone growth is still strong but slowing.<\/p>\n The total internet population reached 2.6 billion in 2013, KPCB said.<\/p>\n For mobile, globally, the report said that only 30% of the world\u2019s 5.2 billion mobile users comprised of smartphones, KPCB said.<\/p>\n Meker said that mobile data traffic, however, is accelerating up 81% year-over-year – due largely to video, where mobile is now 22% of consumption.<\/p>\n KPCB also highlighted separate research which found that South Africans spend more time on their smartphones than they do on their laptops, or watching TV.<\/p>\n The research, conducted by Milward Brown, found that South African\u2019s used their smartphones for 127 minutes per day on average, whilst spending 126\u00a0minutes on their laptops\/PCs. TV watching accounted for 115 minutes, with tablets eating up 63 minutes per day, on average.<\/p>\n Globally, 78% of world has TV, versus 73% who own a mobile phone, and 22% with a\u00a0 smartphone. 11% own a laptop, 10% a desktop, and 6% have a tablet.<\/p>\n SA Internet population close to 14 million<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\nMore on South African telecoms<\/h3>\n