Telecommunications giant, Airtel Africa Plc, has announced its revenue increased 9.9 per cent to $2.522 billion during the nine-month period ended 31 December 2019 with Q3’20 revenue growth increasing to 12.8%.
In the financial statements released by the firm on Tuesday to the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), it was disclosed that this was 8th consecutive quarter of double-digit growth in constant currency. Airtel Africa recorded growth across all services – 3.9 percent in voice, 39 percent in data and 40.4 percent in the mobile money business.
Airtel Africa’s customer base grew 9.4 percent to 107.1 million at the end of December 2019.
Underlying EBITDA was $1,118 Mn for the nine-month period, up 13.2%, while constant currency underlying EBITDA growth was 15.5% over the same period. EPS before exceptional items was$ 5.8C and Basic EPS was$ 8.6C
Airtel Africa’s operating profit increased by 21.3% and was up 23.7% in constant currency Free cash flow almost doubled to$ 391 Mn in the period.
Raghunath Mandava, Chief Executive Officer, commented on the trading update:
‘Today I am pleased to announce another set of strong results which further demonstrate our on-going ability to deliver against the opportunities offered by the markets in which we operate. Our financial performance in Q3 was strong as we delivered double digit revenue growth in both reported and constant currency. Revenue growth accelerated in Q3 to 14.2% as a result of improved performance in the Rest of Africa, supported by solid results in Nigeria and East Africa. This is now the eighth consecutive quarter that we have delivered double-digit revenue growth and EBITDA margin expansion in constant currency.
Revenue growth continues to be broad-based across voice, data and mobile money. We have continued to add customers, up 9.4% this quarter, contributing to an increase in voice revenue. We are also increasingly seeing the success of our strategy to lead in the roll-out of our modernised 4G networks, with more than 40% increase in data revenues for the quarter. Alongside this, a focus on increasing the number of use cases through international partnerships for our mobile money offer as well as increasing the distribution footprint have helped gain further acceptance of airtel money.
On a market-specific basis, Nigeria has been leading our growth with double-digit voice revenue growth and over 70% data growth as a result of our lead in 4G rollouts and the huge data capacities we are creating.
We operate in dynamic underpenetrated markets, with good opportunities for continued growth. These results give me confidence that we have the right strategy to continue to deliver against these opportunities.”
