MTN Nigeria has achieved outstanding half-year results, with all major revenue segments growing year-on-year.
Although mobile subscribers decreased by 7.6 million to 68.9 million during this period, data revenue helped the telecommunications giant’s total revenue in the first half of the year increased by 24% to 790.2 billion naira.
According to the financials released on Friday, data revenue increased by 48.3 percent to N228.48 billion and voice calls went up 13.1 percent to N487.6 billion.
“The surge in data was driven by increased usage from the existing base, supported by the acceleration in 4G rollout and enhanced network capacity following the acquisition and activation of additional 800MHz spectrum in Q1,” MTN said.
Data traffic rose by 83 percent year on year (YoY), while Smartphone penetration was up by 5.8 percentage points 49.3 percent.
MTN Nigeria’s 4G network now covers 65.1 percent of the population, up from 60.1 percent in December 2020.
“The impact on voice revenue from the industry-wide suspension of new SIM registration was partly offset by higher usage in our active SIM base as well as migration to a higher quality of experience”, MTN added
Also, MTN Nigeria reports its profit before tax jumped by 54.01 percent to N215.12bn in the first half of this year, while its EBITDA margins for the period came in at 52.7 percent, up 1.4 percentage points from a year earlier.
The company in a bid to maintain its leadership position in the Nigerian telecommunications space committed N186.44 billion in capital expenditure in the period, up some 39 percent compared to the earlier H1, 2020 period.
The Telco was able to generate Free Cash Flow (EBITDA – CAPEX) of N230.7 billion in the period, which was up 19.6 percent from 2020 levels.
