The price of data per MB on Vodacom's network dropped by 15.4% in the past year, while voice rates decreased by 17.6%. This is according to the mobile operator's trading update for the quarter ended 31 December 2016.
Despite price reductions, the telco grew its data revenue in SA by 22% year-on-year, to almost R5.5 billion.
"Data now makes up 40.8% of service revenue [in SA] compared to 35.3% a year ago, with active data customers up 4.9% to 19.3 million," Vodacom says.
In its four international operations, mobile data revenue grew 2.6%, driven by a 12.4% increase in active data customers to 12.6 million, representing 43.8% of the active customer base. Data comprises 25.2% of service revenue in the telco's international operations, up from 22.5% a year ago.
The group says the success of its pricing strategy of making data more affordable to all customers resulted in a 49% increase in bundle sales and the overall price per MB reduction. Vodacom says that over the past four years, it has reduced the price of data by more than 60%.
Group CEO Shameel Joosub says: "Another significant win in helping bridge the digital divide was the introduction of a 4G device below the key R1 000 price-point to add to the success of the Smart Kicka 2, a low-priced yet high-quality 3G smartphone."
Smartphone sales volumes accelerated this quarter by 29%, comprising 62.3% of device sales. The operator added 1.1 million 4G customers in the quarter to reach 4.8 million, as devices became more affordable.
Active smart devices on the network also increased 23.1% to 16.6 million, with the average monthly data usage on these devices at 667MB ? contributing to the 44.8% improvement in data traffic.
Joosub says Vodacom is making an effort to continuously reduce the cost to communicate in SA through its bundle pricing strategy, which saw "significantly more prepaid and contract customers benefit from using bundles".
"The strong demand for data continues with traffic growth of 44.8% in SA and 61.7% across our international operations," Joosub adds.
To support continued data growth and strengthen its network and service differentiation, Vodacom says it invested R2.7 billion in infrastructure, including R2.1 billion in SA, where it expanded 4G coverage to 70% of the population and 3G to 99%.
"Including the current period, capital expenditure across the group will total R40.6 billion over a three-year period, with R27.4 billion in SA alone."