Safaricom today announced its financial results for the year ended 31st March 2015. The results are impressive as the total revenue for the year increased by 13% to Kshs 163.4 billion. The growing customer numbers may have something to do with that is the customer base grew by 8% to bring the numbers of subscribers to 23.3 million. Most of the new subscribers are youth. Fixed service revenue growth has gone up by 22% to Kshs 3.1 billion.
Shareholders will be happy as there is a proposed dividend of Ksh. 25.6 billion which is a 36% increase from last year. Profit after tax increased by 38% to Kshs 31.9 billion which is excellent considering all the capital that was put into projects like bringing Mpesa home. Free cash flow has improved by 21% to Kshs 27.5 billion.
We are truly in the internet age and the numbers prove it. Mobile data revenue grew by 59% to Kshs 14.8 billion. There was an 21% increase in 30 day active mobile data customers to 11.6m which is 50% of Safaricom’s customer base.
The Service revenue had an impressive growth of 13% to Kshs 156.2 billion of which voice service revenue grew by 4% to Kshs 87.4 billion and non-voice service revenue increased by 27% to Kshs 68.8 billion. SMS revenue grew by 15% to Kshs 15.6 billion. Devices and other revenue contribute 4% of total revenue.
The Mpesa value transacted is 34% of our current GDP which is impressive. Mpesa revenue increased by 23% to Kshs 32.6 billion. There was a 14% increase in 30 day active Mpesa customers to 13.9m which is 60% of Safaricom’s customer base. .
Safaricom’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) grew by 17% to Kshs 71.2 billion with an EBITDA margin of 43.6%, up 1.4ppt. Capital expenditure for the period increased by 21% to Kshs 33.7 billion.
Bob Collymore, Safaricom Limited CEO said that Safaricom strives to deliver the best service to their customers and this in turn has allowed them to have strong commercial and financial performance. “We have delivered on our goal to transform lives by providing unmatched services; improving our network quality; and deepening financial inclusion with the customer uptake of Lipa Na Mpesa.”
Some of the key highlights of his speech include
• 4 G network available in Nairobi and Mombasa. And roll out in 13 towns and cities by year end.
• Safaricom building the National Police Network in Nairobi and Mombasa to help with security. Phase one to be launched end of May 2015.
• Mobile penetration at 80.6%* with Safaricom having 67.4% of these subscribers.
• Promotions such as ‘Tetemesha” campaign and the “Bonyeza Ushinde’ campaign contributed to grown in revenue for Voice service and messaging services respectively.
• Mpesa which now contributes 20% of total revenue. Factors that have aided this includes increase of Mpesa agents, the Lipa na Mpesa service, as well as a 14% increase in active Mpesa customers as well as increase in Mpesa transactions
• Mobile data revenue growth has gone up an impressive 59% driven by uptake of affordable data bundles, and the increase in use of smartphones.
• Safaricom invested Kshs 33.7bn on capital expenditure during the year. The population coverage of 3G network has gone to 69%, modernized the 2G network which covers 92% of the population and 30% of their base stations are now connected to fibre.
• The board is recommending a dividend of Kshs 0.64 per share which is an increase of 36%. Pending approval by shareholders dividends will total Kshs 25.64 billion which represents 80% of Safaricom’s net income. This will be the largest dividend in Kenyan history.
Strategic Priorities
• Increase financial inclusion using Mpesa using Lipa na Mpesa service as a method of payment. Promote this to help Kenya move towards a cash-lite economy.
• Grow Business partnerships by providing innovative ICT solutions for businesses. Completing fibre connections to their first 1,000 buildings to further enhance their hosted PABX, fixed calling, fixed data, cloud services and managed services offerings.
• Tomorrow they will be launching Safaricom’s home broadband solution, which is a set-top box that brings the 3G and 4G network into the home, and distributes the superfast connectivity via Wi-Fi to any existing Wi-Fi enabled devices. As an added bonus the set-top box brings Kenyan digital free-to-air TV channels to the customers’ TV. Safaricom will offer a wider range of relevant content and Video-on-demand in the coming year.
• Increasing their 3G population coverage to 80%, and to roll-out their 4G network to an additional 13 towns and cities by December 2015
