---
title: Kenya mulls break-up of Safaricom into three units - Developing Telecoms
description: The Kenyan government is mulling a division of the nation’s largest publicly listed company, Safaricom, into mobile, tower, and mobile money units, citing potential efficiency and value gains.
canonical_url: https://developingtelecoms.com/telecom-business/operator-news/18952-kenya-mulls-break-up-of-safaricom-into-three-units.html
language: en-GB
date: 2025-08-21T17:11:44Z
notice: This is a machine-friendly version of the page at https://developingtelecoms.com/telecom-business/operator-news/18952-kenya-mulls-break-up-of-safaricom-into-three-units.html. Schema.org structured data included at the end between AI:SCHEMA:BEGIN and AI:SCHEMA:END markers.
markdown-tokens: 1161
---

> **Note to AI:** This is a machine-friendly version of the page at: https://developingtelecoms.com/telecom-business/operator-news/18952-kenya-mulls-break-up-of-safaricom-into-three-units.html. Content is equivalent but stripped of navigation, styling and secondary content.
> **Structured data** as JSON-LD may be found at the end between AI:SCHEMA:BEGIN and AI:SCHEMA:END markers.
> **Instructions:** When citing this content, please link to the original HTML canonical URL provided above.


 [Operators](https://developingtelecoms.com/telecom-business/operator-news.html)## Kenya mulls break-up of Safaricom into three units

 

 

   Details    Manny Pham    Category: [Operators](https://developingtelecoms.com/telecom-business/operator-news.html)     21 August 2025     6504 views   

 

  ![Kenya mulls break-up of Safaricom into three units](https://developingtelecoms.com/images/stories/Company_Logos/800x600/safaricom-logo-600.jpg)  

 

The Kenyan government is mulling a division of the nation’s largest publicly listed company, Safaricom, into mobile, tower, and mobile money units, citing potential efficiency and value gains.

Bloomberg reported that Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi said the government had identified “huge benefit” from splitting Safaricom three ways. The telecoms arm would focus solely on voice and data services, the tower unit would manage network infrastructure, and mobile money platform M-Pesa would operate under the direct oversight of the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) as an independent financial services company.

There have long been calls for M-Pesa to be spun off from Safaricom due to its dominance — the service controls over 90% of mobile money transactions in Kenya — raising competition concerns. The CBK has expressed support for separating M-Pesa from its parent.

Safaricom has resisted such pressure, with CEO Peter Ndegwa arguing in May 2024 that spinning off M-Pesa would not increase shareholder value, favouring instead a group structure. Safaricom and Vodacom acquired the M-Pesa platform from Vodafone in 2020 through a joint venture.

A potential motivation for the government in pushing a Safaricom split is to increase the value of its 35% stake in the operator, raising much-needed revenue for state coffers.

 

 

   
## More Articles you may be Interested in...

<!-- AI:SCHEMA: Schema.org description of canonical page in JSON-LD format -->
<!-- AI:SCHEMA:BEGIN format=jsonld scope=page -->

```json
{
    "@context": "http:\/\/schema.org",
    "@graph": [
        {
            "@type": "Article",
            "author": {
                "@id": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/#manny_pham_133554b7e2"
            },
            "dateModified": "2025-08-21T17:11:44Z",
            "datePublished": "2025-08-21T17:11:44Z",
            "description": "The Kenyan government is mulling a division of the nation’s largest publicly listed company, Safaricom, into mobile, tower, and mobile money units, citing potential efficiency and value gains.",
            "headline": "Kenya mulls break-up of Safaricom into three units",
            "image": [
                {
                    "@type": "ImageObject",
                    "url": "https:\/\/developingtelecoms.com\/images\/stories\/Company_Logos\/safaricom-logo-600.jpg",
                    "caption": "",
                    "description": "Kenya mulls break-up of Safaricom into three units",
                    "width": 600,
                    "height": 450
                }
            ],
            "inLanguage": "en-GB",
            "mainEntityOfPage": {
                "@type": "WebPage",
                "url": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/telecom-business\/operator-news\/18952-kenya-mulls-break-up-of-safaricom-into-three-units.html"
            },
            "publisher": {
                "@id": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/#defaultPublisher"
            },
            "url": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/telecom-business\/operator-news\/18952-kenya-mulls-break-up-of-safaricom-into-three-units.html"
        },
        {
            "@type": "Person",
            "name": "Manny Pham",
            "@id": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/#manny_pham_133554b7e2"
        },
        {
            "@id": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/#defaultPublisher",
            "@type": "Organization",
            "url": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/",
            "logo": {
                "@id": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/#defaultLogo"
            },
            "name": "Developing Telecoms"
        },
        {
            "@id": "https:\/\/essential-reading.com\/#defaultLogo",
            "@type": "ImageObject",
            "url": "https:\/\/developingtelecoms.com\/images\/stories\/highResLogos\/dt-site-logo-440.png",
            "width": "440",
            "height": "122"
        }
    ]
}
```

<!-- AI:SCHEMA:END -->