Safaricom and Huawei sign new phone deal

Safaricom has started selling the replacement of Huawei’s Ideos  smartphone in Kenya, aiming for a piece of the rapidly growing top-end mobile market.

The Huawei Ascend Y100 runs on the new Android Gingerbread 2.3 Operating System (OS) which reportedly has improved power management, resulting in a much better battery life of 300 minutes, unlike the previous Ideos U1850’s short battery lifespan.

The Android OS is also said to have a better performance boost than the previous Android Froyo 2.2, with two-to-five times higher speeds.

The launch coincides with Safaricom’s bid to increase its share of the data service market.

The firm’s general manager, consumer business unit, Mr Peter Arina, said the first Huawei phone that Safaricom endorsed was a success after selling 200,000 units of the distributed 250,000 over a short time. This saw a marked increase in Internet usage and 3G utilisation last year.

Mr Arina was speaking at a launch party yesterday held at the Michael Joseph Centre where Safaricom entered into an exclusive deal with Huawei.