Africa’s leading telecommunications company, MTN Nigeria has recorded a 7.6% increase in the number of mobile subscribers in the first half of the year to 74.1 million users.
The mobile subscribers of the telecom company increased by 7.6% to take the tally to 74.1 million. They amassed 5.4 million subscribers in the first half of 2022. The number of active data users on the platform increased by 13.2% to 36.8 million. The active fintech subscribers on the Momo platform rose by 87.3% to 11.5 million.
In a statement, the CEO of MTN Nigeria, Karl Toriola, said:
“During the first half of 2022, we made good progress in strengthening the resilience of the business in the face of our increasingly challenging operating environment, with rising energy, food, and general inflation putting pressure on consumer spending.” The conflict in Ukraine, as well as the implementation of a “zero-COVID” policy in China, has also put a strain on global supply chains. To mitigate global supply chain and exchange rate risks, we accelerated capital expenditure for network expansion into H1 2022. We deployed CAPEX of 31.6 billion nairas to accelerate the rollout of our 4G network, which now covers 75.3% (compared to 65.1% in H1 2021) of the population and accounts for 77.9% of data traffic (compared to 67.2% in H1 2021).
Read: MTN Nigeria Receives Go Ahead From CBN To Run MOMO A PSB
In addition, having acquired one lot of 100MHz in the 3.5GHz spectrum band from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), we are on track to launch 5G services across the country in Q3 2022. 5G technologies deliver significantly high speeds and lower latency, potentially unlocking many new use cases for consumers and enterprises while improving network economics. Since the directive from the NCC for all operators to restrict outgoing calls for subscribers whose SIMs are not associated with NINs, approximately 10 million of those affected have submitted their NIN, of which 2.6 million have been reactivated following verification by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC).
We will continue to engage our affected customers and support NIMC in accelerating NIN enrolment in the country.
Read: MTN group reaffirms its dedication to Nigeria
We maintained strong commercial momentum with a net addition of 5.7 million mobile subscribers in H1. This reflects a pleasing acceleration in the run-rate of monthly net additions during Q2, following the initial impact of the restriction of outgoing calls placed on subscribers who haven’t submitted their NIN as of April 4th, 2022. Our aggressive drive for gross connections supported this recovery as we ramped up SIM registration and NIN enrolment capacity.
We added 2.5 million active data subscribers in H1 as we continued to drive data conversion from the new and existing subscriber base. In addition, we will continue to We will enhance the quality and coverage of our network to accommodate the increasing demand for data. We achieved some important strategic milestones in H1 towards delivering our Ambition 2025 strategy. This includes the final approval for our MoMo Payment Service Bank (PSB) and the commencement of commercial operations on May 19th, 2022, leveraging the solid foundation of our existing MoMo business. We are pleased with the progress since the launch and are excited about the prospects of our fintech business and driving financial inclusion in the country. As of the end of June 2022, we recorded 4.2 million registered MoMo wallets, of which 2.4 million are active, generating MoMo transaction volume of approximately 7 million within 6 weeks of operations.
Top 5 Telecommunication companies in Nigeria
In the last decade, the telecommunication sector has improved greatly, with more entrepreneurs venturing into the sector. The sector has also been through a storm, but only those who survived it and stayed true to their vision are still in the sector today. We mention the top 5 companies in the telecommunication sector in Nigeria:
1) MTN Nigeria
Headquarters: South Africa
MTN Nigeria is a subordinate of MTN Group Limited. Although the company was founded in South Africa. it has become a household name in the telecommunications industry, with over 40% of the market using the telephone operator.
The company is present in several African countries, but it makes a huge chunk of its revenue from Nigeria. The company also bought Visafone and turned it into a subsidiary of the company.
2) Globacom Mobile:
Headquarters: Nigeria
Globacom, which is popularly known as Glo Mobile, is Nigeria’s second biggest telecommunications company and is becoming a very iconic company. The company has the second-highest subscribers in the country and has expanded its operations to neighbouring African countries such as Ghana and the Benin Republic.
To ensure that they provide Nigerian users with fast internet service at the most affordable price, there is a fibre optic cable, Glo 1 Submarine Cable, owned by Glo, which connects the landing base of the company to fibre optic connectivity from the United Kingdom to Nigeria.
3) Airtel
Headquarters: India
The company didn’t start with this name from the onset as it was previously known as V Mobile, Celtel, or Zain; the company used these names previously as it was passed from one owner to another. The company was the first in Nigeria, but it didn’t live up to its full potential due to management issues.
Even though the management issues, the company still has a huge subscriber base and the current owners of the company, Bharti Airtel, are from India; these new owners have provided the much-needed stability the company needs and help in broadcasting the company across Nigeria.
5) 9 Mobile
Headquarters: United Arab Emirates (UAE)
The company was formerly known as Etisalat and its owners are from the UAE- the company has its major stronghold in Arab countries, but since its inception in Nigeria, it has quickly won over its share of the populace through its generous bonus data offering.
Etisalat, as it was previously known, borrowed a loan from a consortium of 9 Nigerian banks, but due to its inability to repay the loan, it was taken over and renamed 9 Mobile.
With the telecommunications sector taking a huge turn in the last decade, companies like Nitel have faded away and are present in the history of the telecom industry, but companies like Glo and MTN are now rewriting the history of the telecom industry.