Airtel Africa Q1 revenue rises as customer base grows

(Sharecast News) - FTSE 250 telecoms company Airtel Africa posted a rise in first-quarter operating profit and revenue on Friday as its customer base grew despite the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.
In the quarter to the end of June, operating profit pushed up 12.9% to $210m, while revenue rose 6.9% to $851m. Revenue was largely driven by an 11.8% jump in the customer base to 111.5 million and average revenue per user growth of 1.6%.

The company said revenue increased all of its regions. Nigeria saw a 17.1% rise, while East Africa and Francophone Africa saw 17.5% and 2.2% increases, respectively. Airtel said growth was broad based across all of its key segments.

Chief executive officer Raghunath Mandava said: "Covid-19 impacted customer usage pattern, particularly during the month of April, however, as some of these restrictions started to be lifted, customer usage trends in May and June returned to being broadly consistent with pre Covid-19 trends.

"The group's performance generally reflected these trends, with revenue growth accelerating in May, and we ended the quarter with 13% revenue growth and 61 bps of EBITDA margin expansion in constant currency."

He said the outlook remains uncertain, particularly as regards a potential second wave of coronavirus infections and the actions governments will take in that event.

"However, these results are further evidence of the growth opportunities our markets offer and the effectiveness of our strategy to focus on winning customers, investing in our network and expanding our voice, data and mobile money businesses."