Publications
Partners
Johannesburg - South Africa’s biggest mobile network Vodacom plans to start selling its LTE-enabled smartphone, the Smart 4 Turbo, from February 9, 2015 at a price of R1 499.
The Vodacom branded device features the Android KitKat 4.4 operating system, a 4.5 inch display, a 5 megapixel rear camera, 4GB internal storage and 1GB RAM.
The Smart 4 Turbo is planned to be available on Vodacom’s website and stores for sale.
“This is the lowest priced LTE-capable handset in Vodacom’s range, giving access to super-fast connectivity via Vodacom’s rapidly growing network of more than 2 000 LTE base stations,” said Vodacom in a statement.
The Smart 4 Turbo is also available on various contracts including the ‘Vodacom Smart S Light’ for R159 per month which comes with 100MB of monthly data, said the company.
Meanwhile, Vodacom said that uptake of its branded smartphones has been positive.
“The own-brand Vodacom range was launched in August last year with the Smart Kicka, which subsequently sold more than half a million devices,” said the company.
“This was followed-up with Smart Tab 3G of which more than 200 000 have been sold so far. The Smart 4 Turbo follows the same approach of high specification without compromising on quality,” added Vodacom.
Vodacom already has around 30 million subscribers in SA and the company was the first to launch LTE or 4G services in the country in 2012.
Falling smartphone prices
Vodacom's launch of its 'Smart 4 Turbo' comes after Microsoft unveiled a low cost Lumia smartphone in South Africa this week.
Fin24 reported on Wednesday that Microsoft has launched its Lumia 535 in South Africa - a dual-SIM Windows Phone device that costs R1 699 on prepaid and R149 per month on contract.
