MTN Group,a South African multinational telecommunications company with more than 290 million customers in 19 markets has recorded steady growth on its quarterly revenue for the period ended on 30 September 2023.
The Group's service revenue grew by 14.2% compare to the previous year period as it was 9.0%.
The Group's main contributor to the revenue rise was data revenue growth of 23.1%,followed by fintech revenue growth of 22.1% and lastly a voice revenue declined.
The Group's total subscribers increased by 1.8% to 290.1 million while its active data subscribers up by 6.7% to 144.6 million and Mobile Money(MoMo) monthly active users up by 0.7% to 63.5 million.
The data traffic increased by 20.1% to 10 612 PB and fintech transaction volumes increased by 33.9% to 12.7 billion.
MTN Group's ship captain has admitted that there were few challenges tried to slowdown their progress in different markets environments where the Group.
He complained about things such as inflation,weak currencies against the dollar and loadshedding which is engulfing South Africa.
Navigating a challenging Q3;Improved network availability in South Africa
Group President and CEO Ralph Mupita said:"MTN maintained a resilient performance in the first nine months of 2023,as inflation remained elevated across our markets with an average blended rate of 17.3% year-to-date(YTD) compared to 14.2% in 2022.Encouragingly,in Q3,inflation has started to show some signs of subsiding across our footprint,led by markets such as South Africa,Ghana and Uganda.
"Foreign exchange(forex) markets remained volatile in the period,with local currencies under pressure against the US dollar and the availability of forex constrained particularly in Nigeria.The rand closed September 2023 at R18.90(December 2022:R17.05) and the naira closed at N777/US$(December 2022:N461).Naira devaluation had a material impact on our results,particularly in Q3.
"Power outages in South Africa continued to be a challenge in the period,however,the significant progress made in our network resilience programme- which is tracking slightly ahead of plan - combined with lower loadshedding in Q3(compared to Q1),has supported average network availability of above 95%.
Solid operational execution and performance
"We remained focused on the execution of our Ambition 2025 strategy to navigate the ongoing macro challenges in our operating environment.We invested capex of R26.2 billion YTD in our networks and platforms and sustained the growth in our business.
"As at the end of the period,11 of our markets have leading network NPS measures including Nigeria,Ghana and Uganda.South Africa's NPS remains #2,with a narrowing gap to #1.The capex intensity of 15.9% achieved in the period is within our medium-term target range of 15-18%.We drove data traffic and fintech transaction volumes growth of 20.1%(up 35.0% excluding JVs and 33.9% respectively.
"The Group delivered an increase in service revenue of 14.2%*,driven by steady growth of 2.6% from MTN South Africa(MTN SA) as well as strong growth in MTN Nigeria(up 21.4%*) and MTN Ghana(up 36.6%*).The slowdown in Q3 service revenue growth(up 12.3%*) was impacted by the conflict in Sudan.Excluding MTN Sudan,the Group service revenue growth in Q3 would have been 13.9%*.
Our subscriber base increased by 1.8% to 290.1 million.This was affected by subscriber registration regulations in Ghana and Nigeria,as well as a decline in subscribers in Sudan amid the ongoing conflict.Active data subscribers were up by 6.7%(to 144.6 million),supporting increased traffic and data revenue growth,"Mupita concluded.