Telkom is eating its rivals' lunch in mobile - Serame Taukobong — Telkom Group CEO Serame Taukobong

Telkom on Monday published its financial results for the three months ended 31 December 2024 – and they’re good, especially in the mobile business, which expanded service revenue by almost 10% year on year.

Mobile subscribers grew by an impressive 21.6% to a record 24 million, including a 17.3% increase in mobile data subscribers – now representing 62.3% of the total mobile base.

Telkom’s consumer business saw its prepaid segment grow by 25% to 21 million subscribers, while the post-paid base remained stable with improved average revenue per user. Ebitda – earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation – jumped by 51.4% to R1.5-billion, with a 6.5% improvement in the Ebitda margin.

Describing the results as “strong”, Telkom said its focus on data-led services has helped it gain market share in mobile and elsewhere.

Highlights

Highlights of the three months include:

Mobile service revenue climbing by 9.6% to R5.4-billion, “outperforming the broader South African mobile market”;
Fixed data and IT services growing service revenues increased by 4.7% and 3.2%, respectively.
Group revenue rising by just under 1% to R11-billion;
Group Ebitda – a measure of operating profit – jumping by 28% to R3-billion, with margins expanding by 5.8 percentage points to 27.2%;
Fibre connectivity continuing its expansion, with homes passed growing by 13.1% to 1.3 million and connected homes up 17.6%.
Mobile and fixed data traffic increasing by 22.2% and 23.7%, respectively; and
Interest-bearing debt reducing by 2.7% compared to September 2024.

“These results provide further proof that the execution of Telkom’s strategy is on track, delivering profitable growth,” said group CEO Serame Taukobong in a statement. “We are excited by the growing momentum across our business units, and we remain confident in our ability to meet our medium-term growth objectives as we continue to invest in our infrastructure, network and digital services.”

Read: Telkom clears last Swiftnet sale hurdle

Telkom said Openserve, its wholesale networks subsidiary, increased the number of homes passed with fibre by 13.1% and the number of connected homes by 17.6%. Data consumption on Openserve’s network jumped by 23.7%, while revenue remained relatively steady at R3.1-billion for the quarter. Margins improved.

IT services business BCX achieved a higher margin, with revenue growing by 6.8% to R1.2-billion in the quarter. Ebitda expanded by 36% to R438-million, with margins improving to 15%. This reflected a “successful transition to scalable, higher-margin service offerings” at BCX, Telkom said.