Vodafone Kiribati covers about 87% of Kiribati’s population and has set a target of 95% inside 18 months, Chief Executive Kamlesh Sharma said in an interview with Exepreneur. Closing the eight-point gap depends on new sites across the Outer Islands, Kiritimati and South Tarawa, according to Sharma, extending 4G+ service to communities that currently have little or none.
The percentage understates the build. Kiribati’s population sits across 33 islands inside roughly 3.5 million square kilometres of ocean, a geography in which each additional point of coverage costs more than the one before it. The last 13% are the households furthest from anything.
Sharma has spent about two decades in Pacific telecommunications across Fiji, New Zealand and Kiribati. He returned to run Vodafone Kiribati on the argument that the network is infrastructure rather than a consumer product.
“Telecommunications in Kiribati is far more than business. It powers education, healthcare, banking, and national growth. Returning to lead Vodafone was my chance to transform one of Earth’s most remote nations,” Sharma said.
Two backhaul routes, not one
Vodafone Kiribati integrated satellite capacity through BNL’s Starlink Community Gateway in December 2025, Sharma said. The low-earth-orbit link cut latency and lifted throughput against the geostationary satellite service the country had relied on, and the company now sells Vodafone-managed Starlink connections directly to customers.
The second route is fibre. Vodafone Kiribati is a partner on the East Micronesia Cable landing in Tarawa, which Sharma said was in testing and scheduled to go live in May 2026, with the company acting as a primary provider of fibre services in South Tarawa.
Running both matters more than either. Satellite alone caps out on speed and capacity, and a single cable is a single point of failure in a country where a repair ship is weeks away.
“Our goal is straightforward. We want to provide reliable, affordable internet for all communities. We’ll close ocean gaps using resilient networks, expanded coverage, international links, and satellite backups,” Sharma said.
Mobile money at 70% registration
Vodafone Kiribati’s mPAiSA platform has registered about 70% of the company’s customers, according to Sharma, with the Outer Islands the main growth area. The service handles payments and purchases by phone in a country where the nearest bank branch can be an ocean crossing away.
Registration is not the same as active use, and Sharma did not give a transaction volume or an active-user figure.
Solar towers and the cost of running them
Most Outer Islands sites run on solar with generator backup, Sharma said, supported by battery systems specified for the conditions. The company has also paired satellite backhaul with conventional towers at sites where laying anything is impractical.
Power is the constraint behind the coverage target. High operating costs, weak grid supply and long logistics chains all raise the cost per site, and Sharma described those conditions as demanding without calling them prohibitive.
What the data centre is for
Vodafone Kiribati is building a data centre intended to host public and private sector workloads locally, Sharma said, along with cloud services and value-added products. Local hosting removes a satellite or cable hop from every transaction that currently leaves the country and comes back.
Sharma gave no completion date, capacity figure or capital cost for the facility.
“Digital access is the bridge that connects our people to opportunity, whether it is a student accessing education, a clinic receiving critical information, or a business reaching new markets. Connectivity changes lives,” Sharma said.
The test
Coverage at 95%, mPAiSA past registration into transaction volume, and a data centre with a stated capacity are the three numbers that will show whether the plan worked.
“Leading here demands hard work, cultural respect, and a long-term vision. It’s about linking people and igniting progress with patience, adaptability, and commitment to Kiribati’s future,” Sharma said.
Eighteen months from that target date, either Vodafone Kiribati publishes a coverage figure starting with a nine, or it does not.
