11/6/2026
Index Partners' News & Updates
In this articlewe explore the key features of the Sub-Saharan fixed broadband market and wherethe opportunities lie.
Connectivity ishigh on the agenda of modern governments, the World Bank, and DevelopmentFinance Institutions, given the role that digitalisation plays in a country'sdevelopment, both internally, by facilitating education, trade, the economicand social integration of regional communities, and the delivery of publicpolicy through e-government; and externally, by facilitating international tradeand increasing a country's influence in the global economy.
Yet thatcritical development lever lags behind in most Sub-Saharan countries. Fixedbroadband penetration remains well below the global average, even in SouthAfrica, where the gap is partly masked by high mobile broadband uptake. Thevast majority of connectivity today is delivered via mobile phones on 3G/4Gnetworks, which are constrained in capacity and increasingly insufficient tosupport sustained growth in high-capacity, low-latency digital applications atscale.
In the same waythat mobile telephony substituted fixed telephony in many developing countries,notably in Central and Eastern Europe at the beginning of the 21st century, arewe seeing a substitution of fixed broadband by mobile and satellite broadbandin Sub-Saharan Africa?
Unlike moredeveloped markets, Sub-Saharan countries largely skipped legacy copperinfrastructure, leapfrogging directly to mobile broadband. But that same 3G/4Ginfrastructure cannot support the next wave of digital growth. In that regard thecomparison with voice communications falls short, because data consumption isexponential and speed and capacity are critical dimensions that mobile networkscannot currently match at scale.
5G networksremain very limited across the region and will require substantial investmentto cover urban areas and beyond.
Satellitebroadband provided by LEO constellations is also bound to play a growing role,but at current pricing levels, satellite broadband adoption in Sub-SaharanAfrica remains concentrated in enterprise, institutional, backhaul, andhigher-income consumer segments.
According toGSMA estimates, the mobile broadband gap in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2024 stood at10% on average, while the real problem is the usage gap impacting 65% of thepopulation, which is driven primarily by affordability, device access, anddigital literacy, although fixed broadband availability remains an importantlong-term constraint.
In addition,the digital divide between urban and rural areas cannot be bridged by fibrenetworks alone. Building such networks in remote areas would not be economicalfor the private sector, especially to reach small communities scattered acrossvast land, and it would not be sustainable for governments to heavily subsidisesuch initiatives. In these cases, innovative wireless solutions such as thoseproposed by Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) operators are critical.
Rolling outfibre alone is not the solution, but it will play a critical role in addressingthe Sub-Saharan connectivity gap and unlocking improvements in education,digital literacy, economic development, and in turn increase affordability.According to a 2009 World Bank study, a 10% rise in fixed broadband penetrationhas been associated with a 1.38% increase in GDP in a developing economy.
The following technicaladvantages of fibre make the technology future proof:
• Speed: symmetrical upload/download gigabit-capable connections farexceeding 4G averages.
• Latency: consistently low latency, critical for cloud services, videoconferencing, and real-time applications.
• Capacity: very high long-term scalability per connection.
• Consistency: stable performance regardless of network congestion or distance froma cell tower.
• Durability: a trenched network typically has an asset life of over 30 years andis less sensitive to distance and weather conditions than wireless alternatives.Once deployed, the incremental cost of adding users is minimal.
The opportunityis further evidenced by accelerating data centre investment, cloud adoption, AIworkloads, fintech expansion, and the growing demand for local data processing.
The fibreecosystem in Sub-Saharan Africa spans several distinct player types, eachaddressing different layers of the connectivity stack.
The first layeris to build communication backbones spreading cross-border connectivity withinnations, providing open-access infrastructure for the different stakeholders toparticipate in the digital economy. Governments and DFIs play a critical rolein funding and developing such infrastructure. A notable example was the EBRD’sfirst telecommunications project in Sub-Saharan Africa, the signing in February2026 of a USD100m sovereign loan financing to participate in Nigeria’s ProjectBridge, a nationwide rollout of approximately 90,000 km of fibre-opticbroadband infrastructure financed as a PPP involving the World Bank and ADB.Kenya’s National Optic Fibre Backbone Infrastructure (NOFBI) and DigitalSuperhighway projects are also cases in point.
Fibreconnectivity is critical to fuel digital infrastructure such as telecom towersand data-hungry data centres, which need high capacity and redundancy tosupport the ever-growing demand for cloud computing and AI capabilities.Private wholesale operators, such as Wiocc, Liquid Intelligent Technologies,C-Squared, BCS, play a critical role in the ecosystem by deploying substantialterrestrial networks, typically selling access to mobile operators, cloudplatforms, content providers, and enterprise customers. They include spinoffs suchas Bayobab and standalone new entrants, as well as resellers who are graduallybuilding their own networks as they scale.
Next to thelarge wholesalers are much more nimble challengers, often beginning with FixedWireless Access (FWA) before deploying fibre, targeting both dense urban areasand underpenetrated suburban markets for residential and B2B customers. Theseplayers can move faster and are well-positioned as consolidators. They sitbetween a corporate and infrastructure play, making it critical to understandunit economics (homes passed, take-rate, customer acquisition cost, paybackperiod), as well as their unique selling proposition, addressable market, andcompetitive landscape.
They complementMNOs that are also looking to diversify their income streams and increase subscriberretention by bundling fixed broadband with other services.
• CapEx intensity: these are capital-heavy businesses. Tier 2 operators in particularare often in land-grab mode, requiring significant upfront investment ahead ofrevenue.
Sub-Saharan Africalast-mile operators frequently deploy Fixed Wireless Access as the lower costfirst step to reach customers quickly. The Africa FWA market was worth USD5.07bnin 2025 and is expected to reach USD9.16bn by 2030. But for many operators, FWAserves as an intermediate deployment strategy before selective fibredensification. Once a subscriber base is secured, as traffic loads increase,operators convert to fibre to handle capacity, reduce latency, and improveservice reliability.
The dominant approach for last-mile fibre networksin Sub-Saharan African cities is to deploy aerial cables. Even though these aremore prone to weather conditions than trenched networks, an aerial deploymentcosts 40 to 60% less than trenching and can be deployed much faster, allowing operatorsto grow subscriber bases very efficiently. The deployment choice, whetheraerial or underground, comes down to right of way costs, local regulation and CapExbudgets.
• Homes passed vs. take-rate: this is the fundamental tension in network planning for last-mile InternetService Providers (ISPs). Overbuild risk is real; disciplined deploymentplanning is critical to achieving a timely ramp-up and targeted paybackperiods.
• OpEx: customer acquisition costs, ongoing maintenance, and networkmanagement costs have a meaningful impact on cash generation.
• ARPU (Average Revenue Per User) and affordability: pricing mustbe calibrated to local income levels to achieve the take-rates needed tojustify the build-out, particularly in suburban and peri-urban markets.
• Churn and Network Quality: reducing churn through strong network reliability and responsivecustomer support is a key driver of long-term financial performance.
• Execution risk: delivering on time and on budget requires experienced projectmanagement, a reliable ecosystem of contractors, and disciplined buildprocesses. This is critical to avoid cost overruns and delays in reachingtarget homes passed and subscriber numbers.
• Regulatory environment: access regulation, licensing and permitting timeline, right of waycosts, can all have meaningful impact on returns and must be navigatedcarefully.
• Other risks: power reliability, FX volatility among other parameters are alsocritical and can materially affect deployment economics.
Fibreinfrastructure lends itself to a range of financing approaches, includingsenior secured debt, infrastructure debt with availability-based payments, andequity structures suited to long-term assets. The capital available for thissector is deep and diversified:
• Development FinanceInstitutions (DFIs): active in the space giventheir development mandate to improve digitalisation and ability to catalyseprivate capital. DFIs can finance operators through the whole value chain, fromsmaller ISPs to larger backbone infrastructure projects.
• Private Equity: growth-oriented PE funds targeting profitable operators at earlierstages of scale.
• Infrastructure Investors: larger backbone deployments and wholesale projects tend to offerutility-like income with anchor tenants which is typically attractive to yield-seekinginfrastructure funds looking for long-duration, cash-generative assets.
• Strategics: the sector attracts a range of strategics. From regional and global telecomsacquiring ISPs to extend their product offering or geographic footprint, to infrastructureplatforms such as tower companies seeking adjacent asset exposure, to cloudproviders and hyperscalers pursuing later-stage acquisitions or co-investmentpositions.
The wide rangeof asset classes constituting the fibre broadband ecosystem and the extent ofthe investor universe make the investor selection and transaction structuringall the more important.
The Sub-Saharanfibre broadband opportunity is structural, long-term, and only growing. Theregion’s digital economy cannot reach its potential on mobile broadband alone.Fibre, from international cables and national backbones to last-mileconnectivity in dense urban markets, is the infrastructure on which the nextwave of growth will be built.
But getting itright requires more than capital. It requires disciplined deployment planning,a clear understanding of unit economics, the right financing structure, andexperienced advisors who can support operators across the full transactionlifecycle, from structuring and fundraising to M&A advisory andconsolidation.
Index Partnershas a vast experience of scaling fibre broadband operators, TowerCos, data centresand other digital infrastructure players in emerging markets, through fundraisings for organic and inorganic growth and M&A advisory. We connectprojects with the right mix of private equity, development finance, andinfrastructure capital.
If you are anoperator building fibre infrastructure or an investor targeting digitalinfrastructure, speak to Index Partners.