Kenya’s ICT regulatory framework keeps changing due to the realities of an ever-evolving technology ecosystem. A new Data center license framework is among the latest to be defined by the Kenyan government.
The new license framework was published this year by the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA), the country’s ICT regulatory authority.
Under the Revised Telecommunications Market Structure published in June 2026, data centers now fall under Network Facilities Provider – Tier 1 (NFPT1) and Network Facilities Provider – Tier 2 (NFPT2) licenses.
Originally, data centers were licensed under the Unified Licensing Framework (ULF), which operated under the premise of technology and service neutrality principles.
However, the data center ecosystem has been maturing, and regulations needed to mature with it. This maturity is captured by the critical nature of data centers in our lives today.
A failure can halt critical government services, financial services, retail and more. There was such a case when Huduma Kenya halted services due to power supply issues at its data center.
READ: Kenya’s $1 Billion Microsoft AI Data Center Project Stalls Over Electricity Limits
The critical nature of data centers was succinctly captured in CA’s consultation paper of 2024.
CA wrote, “Given that the facility owner in the second type of data center arrangement significantly influences data accessibility, it is necessary to bring these arrangements within the licensing framework to protect users’ data access rights.”
In the paper, CA noted that data centers need to be regulated similarly to communications tower companies. This meant they fall under Network Facilities Providers despite being providers of passive infrastructure.
Terms of Kenya’s NFP-T1 and NFP-T2 Data Center License
It is worth noting that the CA didn’t just stumble on the new framework and scope. There was public consultation, with responses from industry stakeholders taken into account and published.
After going through consultation and review, the revised Telecommunications Market Structure was ready. Subsequently, David Mugonyi, CA’s Director General, published this notice in the March Gazette,
“Notice is given that the Authority has carried out public consultation on the review of the existing telecommunications unified licensing market structure for the telecommunications services to respond to growing technological and market trends in the sector. The effective date of the Revised Telecommunications Market Structure shall be thirty (30) days from the date of this notice.”
After the process, the data center license moved from the proposed NFP-T3 category and is now consolidated under CA’s two highest infrastructure tiers, NFP-T1 and NFP-T2. These two tiers differ significantly in every respect.
| Aspect | NFP-T1 | NFP-T2 |
| Data center right | Explicitly permitted to establish commercial data centers without needing an additional license. | Data Centers are licensed under this category; existing NFP-T2 holders may establish commercial data centers without an additional license. |
| Geographic scope of underlying infrastructure license | Countrywide, with national access spectrum reservation — the only tier allowed exclusive nationwide spectrum. | Countrywide in principle, but spectrum is assigned successively, county by county, contingent on successful prior deployment. No automatic nationwide spectrum holding. |
| Spectrum acquisition | Bid/assessed price for exclusive countrywide utilization. | Bid/assessed price for exclusive county-level utilization, approved case-by-case per county. |
| Spectrum fees | Initial spectrum fees + annual spectrum reservation fees + annual utilization fees (transmitters/bandwidth/coverage) — full national spectrum fee stack. | Annual spectrum utilization fees based on bandwidth/coverage, but only within approved regions — no reservation fee tier (no nationwide reservation). |
| License term | 15 years, or an optional 25-year term. | 15 years only (no 25-year option). |
| Application fee | KES 5,000 | KES 5,000 |
| Initial license fee | KES 15 million (15-yr license term) or KES 45 million (25-yr License termoption) | KES 15 million (flat — no term-based tiering) |
| Annual operating fee | 0.4% of Annual Gross Turnover or KES 4 million, whichever is higher | 0.4% of Annual Gross Turnover or KES 800,000, whichever is higher |
NFP-T1 is suitable for a large integrated player, with nationwide reach and an option for the ambitious 25-year license.
Formally, data centers are licensed by the regulator under NFP-T2. It is a cost-effective pure-play license for data center operators building countrywide infrastructure incrementally, county by county, without needing locked-in national spectrum from day one.
READ: Amazon Seeks Approval to Build First African Satellite Ground Station in Kenya
Today, the country has 19 data centers, with 15 in Nairobi and 4 in Mombasa. The market size was at 15 MW in 2025 and is expected to hit 25 MW by 2030.
Landing points for submarine cables and satellite earth stations make the country an attractive data center spot, but the requisite power supply remains a hurdle.
