The average postpaid subscriber on MTN South Africa’s network used 21.9GB of data per month, an increase of almost 44% compared to last year. The prepaid data usage figures for the third quarter ended 30 September 2024 did not see a similar increase, with the average data usage of active prepaid subscribers only increasing 6.3% year-on-year to 2GB per month.
In its quarterly trading report released on Thursday, MTN Group announced that its South African operations saw service revenues grow 3.3% year-on-year.
MTN South Africa continued to deliver a solid performance in a challenging operating environment.
Data revenues increased 2.1% and accounted for 47.3% of service revenues. The number of active data users increased by 11% to 21.6 million. Network traffic increased by 32.1%, also driven by higher consumption of fixed-line credentials.
However, voice services revenue fell 5.5% due to lower non-package usage.
Other key figures from the update include:
- Outgoing voice revenue fell 5.5%.
- Data revenue increased 2.1%.
- Fintech revenue increased 61.8%.
- Digital revenue increased 13.6%.
- Business services revenue increased 12.3%.
- Wholesale services revenue increased 0.1% (including inbound voice services revenue).
- Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) increased 2.6% (and a further 3% excluding the gain on the sale of the transmission tower).
- EBITDA margin decreased 0.2 percentage points to 36.4% (excluding the gain on the tower sale, it was -0.1 percentage points to 36.3%).
“MTN South Africa delivered a solid performance in an operating environment that remained challenging, with positive growth across all the main business segments” the trading update stated.
“Despite a slight moderation in inflation to average 4.9% (2023: 6%) over the first nine months and the appreciation of the rand against the US dollar, South African consumer spending remained under pressure and the market remained competitive.”
Subscriber growth
MTN South Africa increased its subscriber base by 6.6% to 39.2 million active users. This represents a net addition of approximately 760,000 in the third quarter. Year-to-date net adds reached 1.8 million. Postpaid subscribers increased 2.7% to 4.2 million (excluding telemetry) and prepaid subscribers increased 6.2% to 29.5 million.
Domestic roaming revenue decreased 13.3%, reflecting renegotiated terms with Cell C from early 2024. Wholesale revenue excluding inbound voice calls increased 1.2%.
Fintech revenue increased 61.8%, driven by both XtraTime and MoMo. XtraTime rose 55.7% and MoMo (mobile money) revenue “grew rapidly from a low base” due to the continued expansion of its product portfolio to include insurance and credit services.
