Sub-Saharan mobile on the agenda at Mobile World Congress 2013

This makes it one of the world's largest pools of mobile subscribers. Buoyed by the innovation of home-grown entrepreneurs, it has played a significant role in applying mobile to verticals such as education, healthcare and finance.

Challenges for mobile in the sub-Saharan region

There are, however, significant challenges for sub-Saharan Africa as a region, such as maintaining operator profitability and revenues as mobile penetration spreads to less affluent customers; and ensuring regulation keeps pace with the potential of the region. The solutions that arise have the potential to be a blueprint for the mobile industry across the rest of the planet.

These are some of the issues that will form the basis of a conference session panel discussion to be chaired by Bradley Shaw, South African managing editor of Africa Telecoms magazine, on Tuesday, 26 February 2013, at the Mobile World Congress 2013 in Barcelona.

In addition to the conference session promising to spark hot debate, it is hoped that some resolution can also be achieved to the common issues generated by the exponential growth in this sector across the continent.

This will be Shaw's fourth visit to the gathering of mobile-focused organisations and individuals which last year hosted over 67 000 attendees. He said that the importance of the sub-Saharan region had grown substantially each year, attracting increasing numbers of delegates seeking fresh opportunities and key learnings.

"Africa is an exciting space for the mobile industry as a whole," said Shaw. "Through mere necessity beset by the unique challenges presented across the continent, it continually evolves and shifts, often producing pioneering innovation picked up by the rest of the world."

Joining Shaw on centre stage will be: