Safaricom announced flat profit growth in its full 2023 financial year as income was dampened by investment into its new Ethiopian unit and inflation.
In a statement, the group detailed in its financial year ending March 31 (2024), capex spend of KES 93.54 billion (US$713.8 million), with KES 46.25Bn (US$322.4 million) used for operations deployment in Ethiopia.
Group service revenue grew 13.4% to KES 335 billion which was supported by growth in M-Pesa, mobile data and fixed data. Customer base grew 6.8% year-on-year to 49 million, while monthly active customers grew 9.1% to 37.7 million.
Group profit increased by 1.2% year-on-year to KES 63 billion.
Focusing on Safaricom Ethiopia, which has been in operation now for a full year, saw service revenue at KES 5.7 billion supported by mobile data revenue of KES 4.17 billion and voice revenue at around KES 1 billion.
Customer base in Africa’s second most populous nation currently stands at 9.4 million, with 2,806 mobile sites deployed which is available to 38% of Ethiopia's over 100 million population. Data usage in Ethiopia stood at 4.3GB on average.
M-Pesa was launched in Ethiopia in August 2023 and currently there are 4.51 million registered customers with over 25,000 M-Pesa agents onboarded.
Safaricom CEO Peter Ndegwa said in an investor briefing: "We expect that from 2025, Ethiopia will start being a significant growth contributor at group level for both top and bottom line," reported Reuters.
Safaricom had stated in the past it will take up to five years for its stratgey to deliver growth in Ethiopia.
