MWC25 Barcelona: About half of mobile telephony group MTN’s 290 million subscribers use data actively.
However, this means the other half remains “stuck” in the voice era, according to group president and CEO Ralph Mupita, speaking yesterday at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona.
Mupita was among the CEOs who detailed the challenges, opportunities and transition from connectivity providers to tech companies (techcos) on day one of MWC25.
The global mobile connectivity conference, run by the GSM Association, kicked off yesterday, in host city Barcelona, Spain.
Mobile provider MTN operates in 17 markets, and its group CEO believes the telco, as well as other mobile operators on the continent, have “a lot” of work ahead to take the people of Africa forward through digital technologies.
“We’re a company that’s moved forward in embracing the technologies and enabling people who previously did not have any financial services to now benefit from…the dignity of being able to transact, send money and be able to trade and drive micro e-commerce businesses. We now have over 60 million subscribers actively using our mobile money solutions.”
Mupita noted the African continent’s current position highlights its potential and the growth it must still achieve.
“We’re still living in a world where internet usage is at about 30%. The coverage gap is not an issue anymore, but the continent still suffers from the issue of the usage gap. Over the next five years, it’s anticipated that internet usage will move for the one-and-a-half billion people on the continent, from 30% to 40%, while smartphone penetration is expected to accelerate as smartphones become more affordable and more Africans use the internet regularly.
“We’re seeing an explosion of data traffic and having to invest in our networks to carry the capacity that comes with more Africans using the internet. We also anticipate that we’ll see another 250 million Africans, over the next five years, being attached to networks and being able to live more empowered lives.”
Turning to the topic of transitioning from telco to techco and what that means, Mupita emphasised that the company is embracing and bringing together various technologies to transform MTN's business model.
As a result, MTN has identified three main platforms to focus on: connectivity, fintech and digital infrastructure, each with specific growth opportunities.
The company views connectivity and services beyond connectivity in and of itself as a platform, as it serves consumers, enterprises and also wholesale services, he noted.
“The second area that we are seeing as a platform is fintech; the evolution of mobile money services towards fintech. We believe this is one area of growth that will distinguish MTN going forward, and we are increasingly adding what we call advanced services to better serve the African people of our continent.
“The third platform is digital infrastructure − looking at the assets that we have, particularly around subsea cable and fibre, and increasingly looking at our data centre portfolio and ensuring it can participate in the future, which is going to have AI-driven solutions.”
Delving into 5G, the CEO said it’s likely to be an enterprise solution, more than simply a consumer solution.
“We’ve also started to look at things like 5G mining, private networks. In SA, we’ve worked with Huawei, one of our partners, looking at how we take a slice of the spectrum that we secured in a recent auction in SA to create a private network and be able to do opencast mining.”
Mupita added that MTN is beginning to review its data centre estate. This is to ensure that in the next five to 10 years, as the AI revolution impacts the African continent, MTN has AI-ready data centres and market positions that will benefit the African continent.
“We are making moves in that direction to ensure we are a big participant as a player in terms of the revolution that we see ahead of us. As we think about AI, obviously it’s early days, the use cases are many…we’ve begun to explore, experimentand start using AI for driving additional revenue over time.
“Also, to think internally about AI use cases, about the ways of working that we have as MTN; how do we also look at reducing costs, improving efficiencies. The discussion with the team is how AI should really be about giving us new revenue streams in the next five to 10 years, and that's an area we've been putting a lot of focus on.”
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