Ghana: MTN saw subscriber numbers drop by 9.3% in first nine months of 2023

December 15th 2023

Africa, Ghana, MTN, Subscribers

MTN is the main Ghanaian telecoms operator in terms of number of subscribers. The company had a market share of 67.32% as of January 2023, according to the latest statistics from the regulator. 

Ghanaian telecommunications company Scancom PLC (MTN Ghana) reported that it had 25.8 million at the end of the first nine months of the financial year 2023. This represents a decline of 9.3% from its base at the end of the first nine months of 2022.

MTN Ghana attributes this decline to the national mobile subscriber identification campaign launched by the National Communications Authority (NCA) on October 1, 2021 ,” explains the company.Since then, 0.6 million SIM cards have been re-registered, bringing the total number of disconnected SIM cards to 4.9 million at the end of September 2023. On the directive of the regulator, the telecoms operator blocked 5.4 million unregistered SIM cards as of May 31, 2023. “ 

Meanwhile MTN Ghana added around 4.06 million new subscribers in the first nine months of the year. Additionally, the number of active data subscribers increased by 2.7% to 14.5 million. The number of active Mobile Money (MoMo) users increased by 16.3% to 14.4 million.

Furthermore, MTN Ghana was able to record a total revenue of 9.68 billion cedis ($803.9 million), an increase of 36.1% year-on-year. This growth was notably supported by the growth of voice services, data services and mobile money services. The operator’s earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) also increased by 32.6% to GHS5.4 billion.

Recall that MTN Ghana held 67.32% of the national mobile subscriber base as of January 2023, according to statistics from the National Communications Authority (NCA). Its competitors Airtel and Vodafone had 14.51% and 18.17% market shares respectively.

Source: Agence Ecofin Back