New Delhi: Bharti Airtel<\/a>’s Africa operations reported net profit of $116 million for the third quarter this fiscal, which increased 12.6% on-year and 31.8% from the preceding quarter’s $88 million, on account of higher revenues and decrease in exceptional item expenses.
Consolidated revenues grew quarter-on-quarter to $1,034 million, while average revenue per user (ARPU) increased from $2.8 to $2.9 in the October-December period, as per financial results released Friday.
Raghunath Mandava<\/a>, CEO, Airtel Africa<\/a> said strong growth in revenue and earnings is partly due to “our continued delivery of strong customer growth in Q3, despite the introduction mid-December of additional customer registration requirements in Nigeria.”
“This has meant a temporary halt to the ability of all operators in the country to onboard new customers. But we are working closely with the government to ensure that all our subscribers provide their valid National Identification Numbers (NINs) and update their SIM registration records, such that disruption is minimised,” he said.
Mandava added that Airtel<\/a>’s rollout into rural markets, along with robust customer growth, helped voice grow 10%, while data and mobile money<\/a> continued to be growth engines, with over 30% growth. Data revenues grew 4.2% to $295 million while mobile money transaction value shot up 11.3% to $12,959. Data ARPU, however, declined marginally from $2.5 to $2.4.
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