Airtel’s Mobile money subscription up by 14.9%

By Monica MUEMA

Airtel Africa’s mobile money subscrption grew by 14.9% reflecting its continued investment into distribution to support increased financial inclusion across our markets. Transaction value increased by 28.7% in constant currency with annualised transaction value of $120bn in reported currency.

The firm’s data ARPU saw a growth of 9.6% and mobile money ARPU growth of 8.8% in constant currency continued to support overall ARPU’s which increased 9.3% YoY.

Data capacity across its network rose by 33% with the rollout of almost 3,000 sites and over 5,600 kms of fibre.

The group’s revenue in constant currency grew by 19.0% in Q1’25, driven by 33.4% growth in Nigeria and 22.3% growth in East Africa, respectively. Reported currency revenues declined by 16.1% to $1,156m reflecting the impact of currency devaluation, particularly in Nigeria. Across the Group mobile services revenue grew by 17.4% and Mobile Money revenue grew by 28.4% in constant currency.

With a substantial increase in fuel prices across its markets and the lower contribution of Nigeria to the Group after the naira devaluation contributed to a decline in EBITDA margins to 45.3% from 49.5% in Q1’24 and 46.5% in Q4’24. However, constant currency EBITDA increased 11.3% whilst reported currency EBITDA declined by 23.3% to $523m.

Profit after tax of $31m was impacted by $80m of exceptional derivative and foreign exchange losses (net of tax), arising from the further depreciation in the Nigerian naira during the quarter.

“The continued revenue growth momentum once again reflects the resilient demand for our services, with sustained growth in our customer base and usage. Our superior execution enables us to capture these opportunities, whilst retaining our reputation as a cost leader across the industry.

Having visited most of our OpCos since I joined Airtel Africa, I am encouraged by the scale of the opportunity available across our markets in both the GSM and mobile money business. A key priority for us is to look for new opportunities to further grow our business especially in the enterprise, fibre and data centre businesses across our footprint in Africa.

We will build on the strong foundation established over many years to deliver on these new business opportunities. Most importantly, our emphasis is on significantly improving customer experience by simplifying customer journeys and providing best in class network experience to our customers, whilst remaining focused on driving efficiencies across the business.

We have initiated a comprehensive cost optimisation programme across the Group. We have already seen success in this project, with savings arising in network and distribution costs, and continued opportunities as contract renegotiations continue. We expect sustainable savings to continue as the year progresses.

A strong capital structure is critical to enabling these ambitions and future proofing our ambitious growth targets. During the quarter, we fully repaid the outstanding debt due at the HoldCo and we remain committed to further reduce foreign currency exposure across the Group to limit the impact of currency devaluation on our business. The growth opportunity across our markets remains compelling and we continue to focus on margin improvement as indicated in our FY’24 results.”