Airtel breaches the century subscriber barrier

August 29, 2019 in Business, Companies, Technology & Telecoms by Editor

African telecom operator Airtel has crossed the 100 million subscriber mark across its operations in 14 markets on the continent, the company has announced, for the first time placing it among a select group of peers on the continent.

Raghunath Mandava, the chief executive of the company’s Africa division broke the news in August 28 saying, “I am delighted to report that Airtel Africa has crossed the 100 million subscriber mark. The positive momentum we have seen in customer acquisition, further underpins our medium-term aspirations for revenue and profit growth.”

He added that  the company’s Africa’s footprint is characterized by low but increasing mobile connectivity, with a unique user penetration at 43pc, highlighting the potential for growth across its footprint.

“The company believes in enhancing connectivity and digitizing the countries in which it operates and has invested to expand its network footprint and number of 4G sites to enhance network capabilities and support its future business growth.

A combination of an under-penetrated telecom market, a young addressable population and rising smartphone affordability, along with low data penetration and an underbanked population, will drive the growth opportunities for the data and mobile money segments moving forward,” Mandava said further.