Cell C fined R500,000 after roaming bill dispute

Lumela,

Victoria from Techpoint here,

Here’s what I’ve got for you today:

Cell C fined R500,000 after roaming bill dispute
Maroc Telecom’s gain dip despite subscriber growth
P1 Ventures closes its first $50M institutional fund

Cell C fined R500,000 after roaming bill dispute

Cell C building — Image Source: Mybroadband

Cell C,a telco in South Africa, just got hit with a R500,000 ($26,000) fine after the National Consumer Tribunal ruled against it in a major roaming bill dispute.

Per MyBraodband, this all started when a customer, Julie Williams, was slapped with an unexpected R11,265 ($585) roaming bill after a trip to France in 2022. The crazy part? She had called Cell C before her flight to set a spending limit and was assured it was in place.

Williams had insisted on a R2,000 ($104) limit, but after some back-and-forth, Cell C’s agent set it at R3,785 ($196). She later found out that using just 100MB on Google Maps cost her nearly R9,000 ($467), plus a 25% roaming surcharge. Cell C tried to argue that she was warned about high international roaming charges and that delays in billing from foreign networks could make spending caps unreliable.

But the Tribunal wasn’t buying it. They slammed Cell C, saying it had a duty to make sure customers weren’t unfairly charged and that it couldn’t just shift the blame to foreign networks. The ruling basically overturned standard roaming policies used by all South African mobile operators, calling Cell C’s behaviour “unconscionable.”

It gets better. Cell C was also ordered to cover Williams’ legal costs, which is pretty rare. The Tribunal even called her case a “David and Goliath” battle, where she had no choice but to hire a lawyer to fight a massive telecom company. She was represented by Gerhard van der Merwe from Trudie Broekmann Attorneys, and apparently, this is only the second time anyone has won a case like this against a mobile provider.

Cell C isn’t happy. They’re saying the ruling has huge consequences for the entire industry and that they might challenge it. According to them, they were transparent, acted fairly, and followed industry standards. Their legal team is currently reviewing the decision and considering their next move.

This case could shake things up for international roaming in South Africa. If other consumers follow Williams’ lead, mobile operators might be forced to change how they handle roaming charges. For now, though, Cell C has to pay up, and customers might finally have a chance to fight back against surprise bills.

Maroc Telecom’s gain dip despite subscriber growth

Maroc Telecom's building — Image source: L’economiste

Last week, Maroc Telecom dropped its latest numbers, and while its gain took a tiny dip (0.4% down to $616 million), things aren’t looking too bad.

The company is still making moves in high-speed broadband, and its revenue actually grew by 1.2% to 36.7 billion dirhams. A big part of that came from its African subsidiaries, where fixed data services in Morocco saw a 9.2% boost.

Despite the slight profit drop, Maroc Telecom is still investing heavily, putting 20.8% of its revenue back into expansion. It even signed a fresh deal with the Moroccan government to pump 10 billion dirhams ($2.7 billion) into telecom infrastructure over the next three years. Meanwhile, its customer base keeps growing, now up 4.5% to 79.3 million. Oh, and shareholders can look forward to a dividend payout of 1.43 dirhams per share.

By the end of September 2024, its subscriber count had jumped 6.1% to 79.7 million. Mobile users in Morocco hit 19.9 million, thanks to growing demand for postpaid services. But the real action is happening in its international markets under the Moov Africa brand, which now has 56 million users across ten African countries. Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, and Mali are its biggest markets, but even smaller ones like Togo, Mauritania, and Gabon are growing.

Fixed broadband and landline services are also seeing solid growth, especially in Mali, which now has 253,000 fixed-line customers. Across Africa, its total fixed-line user base is at 400,000, while broadband has hit 255,000 as more people look for reliable internet. Burkina Faso and Côte d’Ivoire seem to be its biggest international bets for long-term growth.

Maroc Telecom isn’t just some new player, it’s been around since 1998 and is Morocco’s biggest telecom company. The government owns 22%, Etisalat Group holds 53%, and French firm Vivendi has the rest. It’s been leading Morocco’s digital transformation for years, introducing fibre-optic Internet in 2016 and offering everything from mobile to 4G+ services.

Beyond Morocco, it operates in ten African countries, generates 40% of its revenue outside its home turf, and has been listed on the Euronext and Casablanca stock exchanges since 2004.

P1 Ventures closes its first $50M institutional fund

P1 Ventures, a Pan-African early-stage VC, just closed its first $50 million institutional fund, pulling in backing from African conglomerates, family offices, and big players in global venture capital. Even the World Bank’s IFC is on board. They’ve also got some heavyweight advisors, including Bernard Dalle from Index Ventures and Emil Michael, Uber’s former CBO.

With this final close, P1 Ventures now manages over $60 million in assets and is going all in on supporting bold African startups. One of their biggest moves? Co-investing with Accel in Morocco’s Nuitee’s massive $48 million Series A round.

So, what sets them apart? Their data-driven approach. P1 Ventures uses AI-powered tools and a massive database tracking 10,000 companies to spot promising startups early. This strategy has helped them back businesses that have already created over 6,000 jobs across 20 countries and impacted more than 10 million lives.

They’re also making big moves in Francophone Africa, where companies like InstaDeep, Wave, and their own portfolio company Nuitee are thriving.

P1 Ventures has backed startups that adapted global business models for Africa, like Yassir, Algeria’s super app with 8 million users, and Chari, the first Moroccan fintech to hit a $100 million valuation. But now, they’re setting their sights even higher. Instead of just bringing outside models into Africa, they’re focused on scaling African startups to a global audience, especially in AI.

And that vision is already coming to life. Their portfolio is full of ambitious companies making moves beyond Africa. For example, there’s Morocco’s Nuitee, an AI-powered hotel booking platform teaming up with Hilton and Sabre; Egypt’s Gameball, a gamified loyalty platform serving over 3,000 customers around the globe; and South Africa’s Salus, founded by a former Konga CTO, that’s making software deployment way easier.

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