MTN announced it has spent R6.9 billion ($484.4 million) since the beginning of 2016, twice what it did in 2015 over the same period, to improve its mobile data service. “Revenues from data remain a top priority. We registered a significant growth during the first semester,” said Phuthuma Nhleko, MTN’s managing director.

At March 31, 2016, the global number of MTN users fell by 1.4% or 3.16 million users. The biggest drop (-3.4%) was recorded in Central-West Africa as number of users in Nigeria decreased by about 7% over the period. In South Africa where it has its headquarters, MTN recorded a 1.4% fall in its number of users.

The group said this was due to the need it had to make its customer base meet regulatory conditions for mobile networks users. Asides Nigeria and South Africa, the group’s number of users fell in 16 out the 24 countries where it operates.

Despite this, MTN Group started the year with 229.3 million users against 227.5 million during Q1 2015. It also indicated that its revenues over the period improved significantly, mainly due to good results for data consumption which surged 123% compared to the previous year.

In Nigeria, MTN is still negotiating with authorities over $3.9 billion it was fined for failing to deactivate SIM cards.

Idriss Linge