According to a new research report from the leading IoT analyst firm Berg Insight, the number of active fleet management systems deployed in commercial vehicle fleets in South Africa reached an estimated 2.1 million in Q4-2022.

Growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.2 percent, this number is expected to reach 3.8 million by 2027.

South Africa is a relatively mature telematics market and the penetration rate is comparably high from an international perspective. Far from all deployments are however full-scale advanced fleet management solutions. A notable share of the installed fleet telematics systems on the South African market is represented by comparably low-end tracking systems, e.g. light FM solutions, including SVR systems extended with basic FM features.

The South African fleet management market is clearly dominated by five domestic players with broad telematics portfolios that together represent 70 percent of the total number of fleet management systems in use in the country.

Rickard Andersson, Principal Analyst, Berg Insight, said:

“Berg Insight ranks Cartrack, Tracker and MiX Telematics as the largest providers of fleet management solutions in South Africa.”

He adds that Cartrack alone has more than half a million active FM units in the country.

“The remaining top-5 players are Ctrack and Netstar”, continued Mr. Andersson.

Other top-10 players on the South African fleet management market include local providers such as Bidtrack (Bidvest Group), Digicell and GPS Tracking Solutions (Eqstra Fleet Management), as well as international players including Webfleet (Bridgestone) and Gurtam. Lytx, Autotrak, Digital Matter, Scania and Powerfleet (Pointer SA) are additional top-15 providers, all having estimated installed bases of at least 15,000 fleet management units in the country. Players just outside of the top list include Key Telematics/Radius Payment Solutions, Geotab, Mtrack (Electronic Tracking Systems), iCAM Video Telematics, FleetCam and Globaltrack.

“In addition to Scania, comparably large installed bases of OEM fleet telematics systems in South Africa have also been achieved by manufacturers such as Daimler Truck, UD Trucks and Volvo Trucks”, concluded Mr. Andersson.

The new study also includes an outlook on the overall African market. Africa is clearly a highly diverse geographic region from a fleet management perspective. The continent can in general be divided into three subregions – South Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding South Africa) and Northern Africa. The South African fleet telematics market is far ahead of the rest of the continent in terms of adoption, whereas Sub-Saharan Africa is the least developed region if excluding South Africa. Northern Africa is comparably advanced and well ahead of Sub-Saharan Africa when it comes to fleet telematics penetration, though still quite a bit behind South Africa.

The African fleet management market beyond South Africa is by many industry representatives described as challenging. The weak economic conditions and foreign exchange rate fluctuations in combination with the unstable political climate make the Rest of Africa market a challenging business environment overall. There are however promising prospects for players adapting to the local market dynamics as the Rest of Africa market has considerably more untapped opportunity than what South Africa can offer at this stage.

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According to a new research report from the leading IoT analyst firm Berg Insight, the number of active fleet management systems deployed in commercial vehicle fleets in South Africa reached an estimated 1.6 million in Q4-2018.

Growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 15.0 percent, this number is expected to reach 3.2 million by 2023.

South Africa is a relatively mature telematics market and the penetration rate is comparably high from an international perspective. Far from all deployments are however full-scale advanced FM solutions. A notable share of the installed fleet telematics systems on the South African market is represented by comparably low-end tracking systems, e.g. light FM solutions, including SVR systems extended with basic FM features.

“The South African fleet management market is clearly dominated by five domestic players with broad telematics portfolios, each having over 100,000 fleet management units in use in this market”, said Rickard Andersson, Principal Analyst, Berg Insight.

He adds that these top-5 players collectively account for more than two thirds of the total number of fleet management systems in use on the South African market.

“Berg Insight ranks Cartrack and MiX Telematics as the largest providers of fleet management solutions in South Africa, together having more than half a million active units in the country”, continued Mr. Andersson.

Tracker is the third largest player followed by Netstar and Ctrack (Inseego). Other top-10 players on the South African fleet management market include local providers such as Bidtrack (Bidvest Group), Digit Vehicle Tracking (Digicell) and GPS Tracking Solutions (Eqstra Fleet Management), as well as international players including Webfleet Solutions (Bridgestone) and Gurtam. Bidtrack’s owner Bidvest is notably in the process of acquiring Eqstra Fleet Management including GPS Tracking Solutions. Players just outside of the top list include Autotrak, Digital Matter, Pointer Telocation (PowerFleet), ACM Track, PFK Electronics, Geotab and Key Telematics.

“International commercial vehicle OEMs including Scania, Daimler, MAN and Volvo Group have further all introduced fleet telematics solutions in South Africa”, concluded Mr. Andersson.

Berg Insight’s report on Fleet Management in South Africa also includes an outlook on the overall African market. Africa is clearly a highly diverse geographic region from a fleet management perspective. The continent can in general be divided into three subregions – South Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding South Africa) and Northern Africa. The South African fleet telematics market is far ahead of the rest of the continent in terms of adoption, whereas Sub-Saharan Africa is the least developed region. Northern Africa is comparably advanced and well ahead of Sub-Saharan Africa when it comes to fleet telematics penetration, though still quite a bit behind South Africa.

The African fleet management market beyond South Africa is by many industry representatives described as challenging – though certainly also promising – for several reasons. The weak economic conditions and foreign exchange rate fluctuations in combination with the unstable political climate makes the Rest of Africa market a challenging business environment. There are however promising prospects for players adapting to the local market dynamics as the Rest of Africa market has considerably more untapped opportunity than what South Africa can offer at this stage.

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ZTE Corporation, a major international provider of telecommunications, enterprise and consumer technology solutions for the Mobile Internet, has jointly launched an Internet of Things (IoT) platform in Africa with leading ICT provider, MTN Group.

The innovative platform adopts cutting-edge technologies suited to developing markets, bringing flexible connectivity for devices in the region. ZTE and MTN have also launched a global machine to machine (M2M) SIM card, providing customers with a blanket rate for M2M activity across MTN’s African network.

It has been predicted that by 2020 there will be 50 billion connected devices around the world, facilitated by the growing use of IoT devices and M2M communication. In the Middle East and Africa (MEA), IoT and M2M technology will drive business growth in sectors such as banking, transportation, energy, and public services through smart cities. MTN Group has developed a clear strategy to contribute to this growth, as well as an extensive range of IoT/M2M products and services from connectivity, managed connectivity and end-to-end solutions, designed to provide benefits for businesses, government and consumers.

“Working across such a wide range of vertical markets, from automotive and healthcare to construction and utilities requires a level of flexibility and scalability that only a cloud-based platform can deliver,” said Zhao Peng, VP of ZTE Corporation.

“The new IoT platform provided by ZTE, which is live in South Africa and able to connect and manage machines across MTN’s African footprint, provides a dedicated network to connect devices and systems.”

“At MTN, we are particularly excited by the opportunity that the IoT platform creates for African enterprises, entrepreneurs and developers, as they now have the means to enable and inspire growth in their markets. In addition to this, the platform and its associated integrated network environment will enable MTN to introduce application services with the potential to enhance the socio-economic environment in South Africa and throughout the rest of the continent,” says Mteto Nyati, MTN Group Chief Enterprise Officer.

With the launch of the innovative IoT/M2M platform in partnership with ZTE, MTN has demonstrated its commitment to using bigger, faster networks to provide next-generation services to customers across each of its markets. MTN is working with a number of leading organisations to support the development of smart cities.

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Enabling the vision of the Internet of Things.

FastNet, a leading M2M operator and part of the Telkom SA Group, has today announced its intention to build a network designed specifically for the ‘Internet of Things’ in South Africa. The Internet of Things (IOT) is considered to be the next generation of enabling ubiquitous access of everyday objects to the Internet.

According to IMS Research, by 2020 the number of Web-connected devices worldwide is expected to reach 22 billion, with more than 50% of these applications predicted to be low power devices requiring extremely long battery life that can’t be served by existing technologies such as cellular M2M, WiFi, Bluetooth or Zigbee.

By selecting LoRa technology from the global semiconductor company Semtech, FastNet will target devices and services that require a very long battery lifetime at a low price point, complementing its cellular M2M services, which are optimal for high data throughput applications where there is ample power.

John Myers, CEO of FastNet, said:

“We believe that Semtech’s LoRa RF technology is the most appropriate choice to deploy IOT services, thanks to its long range and secure, bidirectional communication capabilities.”

“LoRa satisfies the requirements of our customers for smart grid, industrial automation, asset tracking, metering, security and many other applications. The value proposition of the LoRa technology is convincing major industries to deploy IOT applications and services which were previously unrealisable.”

“We are very pleased that FastNet has chosen LoRa technology to provide a low power, long range RF network to enable the Internet of Things in South Africa,” said Marc Pegulu, Vice-President of Marketing for Semtech’s wireless sensing and timing business unit.

“This step allows application developers in the region wanting to attach low cost monitoring and metering devices to this network to do so without the cost and overhead of developing their own wireless infrastructure.”

Semtech is working with FastNet and other regional telecoms companies and ecosystem partners to form a LoRa Alliance to promote interoperability between public networks and create an ecosystem of developers to expedite IOT connectivity.

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