Soon You Won’t Need To Own A Decoder And Dish Set To Watch Kwese TV

Kwese TV is on the offensive. They are making moves meant to entice every single Zimbabwean to join the Kwese family. As you know, Kwese TV is an Econet company and being sister companies with those other companies in the Econet group has its benefits.

We saw this back when Kwese was officially launched in the country when Econet announced that subscribers to Kwese TV will be able to visit any ‘Kwese Free Wi-Fi Zone’ and watch the media service from the comfort of their phones for no additional cost. 

This is something which would be difficult for DStv to pull off in Zimbabwe.

Econet announced that the media service would be available from as many as 570 Wi-Fi hotspots around the country. We took it to mean that it would be available even in the WiFi kombis. This turned out to be true. For about two months now, Kwese TV subscribers have been able to watch ‘television’ for free in kombis. 

We reached out to Kwese and they said that there is no daily time limit for subscribers. This means that one could theoretically utilise these hotspots for 24 hours in a day. Typical consumption rate is about 500mb per hour so that would mean about 12gb per subscriber tuned in 24 hours a day.

No one is doing that but you can bet your bottom dollar that a significant amount of data is being used by the Kwese subscribers. That Econet is prepared to let all the Kwese subscribers consume 12gb  of data for free, which admittedly won’t happen but shows their commitment to the Kwese TV service. Mind you up to 4 phones per Kwese subscription can be doing this.

As you would expect, this promotion will only be available for a limited period.

The decoder and dish set problem

This is only available to paid up subscribers. This means one has to purchase a decoder and dish set and have an active subscription to utilise the Free WiFi Zones. This is the case even when one buys their own Kwese bundles, they have to have a decoder and dish set and also an active subscription.

So if one wants to watch Kwese on their phone they have to fork out bond notes for the decoder and dish set and then fork out more for a subscription. After that they then have to dole out more for a Kwese bundle or any other data bundle, seeing as the free wifi zones are for a limited period. It’s a bit ridiculous.

Econet is aware and when we reached out to them they told us that they are working on a new product which will not require one to have a decoder to enjoy Kwese. One would simply need to sign up for Kwese by paying their subscription fee and fixing their internet access situation and they are good to go. Without the decoder requirement, this would make Kwese a like for like competitor to services like Netflix.

We don’t know how much this ‘Kwese exclusively on the internet’ bundle will be but we think it will be less than the $29 required for the satellite option.

As we suspected, the Kwese Free WiFi Zones are meant to familiarise subscribers with the whole television on the internet thing. It is a marketing and awareness campaign. The challenge in Zimbabwe is that data is expensive but imagine how easier it would be to convince someone to join Kwese when the process only takes minutes and does not involve some stranger going to their home to drill holes on walls. Data prices will decrease eventually so Econet is planning for the not too distant future.

All in all the move is meant to kill multiple birds with one stone. The obvious one is that it acts as an added incentive for a consumer to pay the $29 monthly subscription, ditching DStv in the process. You will remember that one needs an active Econet line to log into the WiFi zones. An Econet sim card is kept active by recharging it, that means money exchanging hands.

As you can see, the Econet group stands to gain more the more we watch Kwese TV online. You will not only have to subscribe for Kwese TV ($29 or possibly less for the exclusively online option), you will also need to purchase a data bundle, the Kwese bundle offered to Econet subscribers being the option to beat.

If not the Kwese bundle, truth is the majority would still be giving their money to the Econet group for internet access. Econet dominates mobile broadband whilst ZOL and Liquid the fixed internet space. Your money will land in Econet’s pocket one way or the other, deal with it.

Thought was put into this strategy and Kwese losing broadcasting permission at a point like this would take them ten steps back. There is that matter where it is being reported that Kwese might not have a licence since they terminated their contract with Dr Dish. It is being reported that Kwese is utilising a permit but experts say the Broadcasting Services Act does not allow for such.

We reached out to Kwese concerning that licence issue and once we get their side of the story we will be sharing. Kwese cannot afford to have any drama at the moment especially with new products in the pipeline. They have built momentum and getting banned for the umpteenth time could be the straw that breaks consumers’ patience.

What do you think about all this? For those not on the Kwese bandwagon yet, would you consider the Kwese on the internet product? We know the stable unlimited internet access requirement makes it a non-option for most just like Netflix. What about you Netflix subscribers would you consider Kwese considering you kind of have the internet access problem fixed?