MTN SA has clawed back some of the market share it recently lost to Cell C after putting promotional offers on the table. However, this seems to have come at the cost of average revenue per user, which declined in both its contract and prepaid customer bases.
The mobile operator - Africa's largest - this morning released its quarterly subscriber update for the three months to September. Overall, it grew subscribers 2% to 219 million. Its biggest gains were recorded in South Sudan, which gained 11.9% to 787 000; Zambia, at 10.9% to 4.4 million; and Cameroon, which grew 9.7% to 11.2 million.
Locally, MTN bolstered its base 5.7% to 26.7 million. The group explains the addition of 1.4 million net customers is mostly because of competitive offers such as "rush hour" and "talk free" in the prepaid segment.
The prepaid subscriber base increased 7.1% to 21.2 million, and minutes used gained. Contract customers gained marginally to 5.5 million, with two million of those additions being telemetry SIMs. However, average revenue per user dropped 4.6% among contract customers, and 4% among prepaid subscribers.
Gaining traction
BMI-TechKnowledge director Brian Neilson says MTN SA has seen a bounce back after losing quite a bit of market share to Cell C. However, he notes its gains could also depend on whether it has changed the methodology for accounting for subscribers.
Neilson adds MTN's gains could be because of promotional activity, although its lower tariff offerings could explain why average revenue per user has dropped.
MTN also noted data revenue growth at its local operation was muted, largely impacted by a 17.9% decrease in the average effective rate per megabyte. Data now contributes 22.7% of the operation's total revenue.
Data subscribers increased to 16.1 million and data use grew 55.9% thanks to "attractive data promotions and improved network quality," says MTN. Overall, data revenue year-to-date gained 34% and now accounts for 17.8% of all revenue.
Group president and CEO, Sifiso Dabengwa, says the results are "encouraging" although the company's performance was "impacted by continued aggressive competition and stringent regulatory requirements".
MTN expects to add another 17.5 million customers to its base by December, an improvement on its previous guidance of 17.25 million.
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