Satellite internet provider Starlink has halted new subscriptions to its service in some parts of Kenya, including the capital Nairobi and six other counties. The company said the reason for the outage was that too many users were trying to access the service, causing network congestion and not enough space.
“Nairobi and the surrounding area are currently at the limit of our network. This means that there are too many users trying to access Starlink service in Nairobi and we currently do not have enough bandwidth to support any additional residential or roaming customers,” the company said in an email to customers.
The company also explained that the main reason for the congestion was because its budget internet plans had been sold out. As such, only plans costing Ksh 130,000 and above per month were available.
Starlink halts roaming across Africa amid significant growth
Network congestion has also disrupted services in affected areas such as Thika, Kajiado, Kiambu, parts of Murang’a, Naivasha, Gong, Machakos and parts of Narok counties. This is why customers in Nairobi and other affected counties have expressed concern that the company is not offering roaming service plans that would allow them to get around local restrictions.
To this end, tech billionaire Elon Musk‘s American satellite internet company said that while there is no roaming service available in Kenya, the team is working to restore service and that users in affected areas will be notified when service is available again. “There are currently no roaming plans available in Kenya. Starlink is working to restore service in affected areas and will send notifications when residential plans are available again,” Starlink added. The Kenya Times report also suggests that the company has removed African countries from its list of available roaming subscription plans. The report said that the service is currently listed as “sold out” for new residential customers in major cities such as Harare in Zimbabwe, Lusaka in Zambia, Nairobi in Kenya and Lagos in Nigeria.
Stellar Systems, an authorized Starlink reseller in Zambia, also warned users that misusing roaming plans in unofficially supported countries could result in permanent suspension of roaming capabilities.
“We hope this is not the case and will provide an update as soon as we hear back from Starlink on this matter,” the company said.
It is worthy of note that Starlink appears to be experiencing tremendous growth in Africa. Its Kenyan subsidiary is no exception, as the company has been increasing its satellite data subscriptions in the country. According to the Communications Authority of Kenya’s (CA) fourth quarter industry statistics report, the number of subscribers increased by a massive 1,955.3%.
