Nigeria is telcos' biggest market but it makes the most money per user elsewhere

folarin okunola

May 15, 2017 3:49 PM

Of the 237 million subscribers the company serves across 22 countries, none spend more than MTN users in Cyprus.

A big fine in Nigeria weighed on MTN's bottom line in 2016

You know how every news story and article about MTN usually mentions Nigeria as the South Africa-based company’s biggest market? Well, that is true. However, Nigeria is not the country where the telecom giant makes the most money per user. Yep. That is also true.

MTN’s recently quarterly update for the first quarter of 2017 coughed up all kinds of interesting numbers but none more than the fact the biggest slice of the telecom company’s ARPU (average revenue per user) comes from one of its smallest markets — Cyprus.

Of the 237 million subscribers the company serves across 22 countries, none spend more than MTN users in Cyprus. In fact, the top three countries where users spend the most, for MTN, are nowhere near Nigeria in terms of population or just sheer land mass.

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Behind Cyprus ($17.10) is the tiny kingdom of Swaziland ($7.75) followed by MTN’s home country South Africa ($6.86). Other countries where users spend more than they do in Nigeria ($3.60) include Congo Brazzaville ($6.51), Botswana (($6.17) and Benin Republic ($5.30).

MTN Group’s total revenue jumped by 7.1% with data revenues climbing 29.4% year-on-year. It would seem the company is gradually clawing its way back from the hit took after the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) slapped it with a mega fine in 2016.

folarin okunola