Mobile Penetration Pushes Digitalization in Africa Gaming Ecosystem

Across the vast expanse of Africa, its 54 nations, there is a considerable variation of mobile phone usage in the continent. The adoption of mobile phones has become an essential part of our everyday life. A little over a decade ago, there were about 300,000 phone lines across the continent.

But today, over 641 million in 2018 expected to reach 871 million by 2025 in which mobile penetration propel the massive young Africa population to go digital the acceptance which has to turn out to be mobile-first the new norm for the average Africans to carry out their daily activities online but not to mention all from social media activities, mobile money, betting on mobile, access information. While it is being used to vote, in contrast, all activities are carried out through their mobile phones. It is not just a device for African, but it is part of their daily activities to carry out whatever task online.

Although the mobile usage is unprecedented in Africa, especially in the iGaming sector which now holds an astounding share in the Africa gambling ecosystem thanks to the competitive mobile market coupled with internet penetration has propel digitalization in Africa seeing the average population using their mobile device as the tool to access all platforms and the gambling industry is no exception unlike in previous years whereas accessing online gaming platforms through mobile phones could be challenging for customers but that has not been the case demand for mobile version platform is on higher-order for bettors in the region.

Bookmakers has no other option than to consolidate to a mobile-centric platforms so to give customers that great experience accessing the gaming platforms this has been pivotal to the growth of gambling business in Africa making the continent one of the hotspot for foreign investors and entrepreneurs across the globe to see the region as untapped gaming and betting markets thanks to its advantage in youth population and infrastructural mobile broadband service availability and adoption services is driving a shift in consumer engagement patterns, from primary voice towards data-centric services.

Across the region, there is a growing demand for more convenient access to online platforms thanks to the increasing digital illiteracy skill of the African people propel digitalization. As mentioned earlier, the mobile-first new norm for African to access information and complete their daily activities is part of their daily lives across all sectors, from payments service, social media, communication services, and e-commerce platforms to mobile betting.

Although the rapid adoption of a mobile device in the region has transformed industries significantly, the iGaming segment is no exception, especially during the related lockdown amid Covid-19 has player’s transitioned to online using mobile phones and the behaviors of customers the way their stake on bets is changing as people prefer using their mobile device. A few years down the line, in Africa, you will often find the magnitude of crowd betting in the shops with people queuing up. But still, that is beginning to change gradually punters now prefer wagering on a game of chance from the comfort of their homes via mobile phones; further, as more African countries are adopting digital transformation and considerable affordable internet service, while bookmakers are also following the trend by offering lighter platforms the numbers of bettors that prefer to wager on betting through their mobile device kept on increasing daily, even though retail betting is still the dominant ways of wagering, but it has been touted that in few years time iGaming betting will overtake retail amid Covid-19.

A perfect example of how punters are evolving betting through their smartphones is alarming. A statistics report from Geopoll survey in some selected African countries indicates the growth rate daily, the mobile betting in some few countries namely, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa Geopoll confirmed that in Kenya that 88% of gamblers that 64% of bettors use smartphones as a standard medium tool for gambling while, Nigeria is in contrast with relative percentage figures with 60.2%. South Africa can be stated to have the lowest mobile phone betting among the three selected countries.

However, South Africa has the high internet penetration rate in Africa and the most significant gambling turnover in the region. Therefore, the mobile betting popularization, as mentioned earlier, was possible due to the competitive mobile market landscape making mobile phones affordable its prevalence and internet penetration contributes to the exponential growth of the betting industry and pushes digitalization and beyond across all sectors in the continent.

About Post Author