Airtel Africa has announced its financial results for the financial year (FY) ended March 31, 2025. The profit after tax (PAT) stood at $328 million as compared to a loss of $89 million in the previous year, representing a 468.2 per cent year-on-year (YoY) increase. The earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) decreased by 5.1 per cent in FY 25 from $2,428 million to $2,304 million during the reporting period.
Meanwhile, the EBITDA margins declined from 48.8 per cent to 46.5 per cent, impacted by increased fuel prices and the lower contribution of Nigeria to the Group. Further, revenue declined by 0.5 per cent in reported quarter from $4,979 million to $4,955 million for the same period.
Mobile services revenue increased by 19.6 per cent in reported period. Meanwhile, the mobile money revenue grew by 29.9 per cent in constant currency.
Further, mobile money subscriber base grew by 17.3 per cent from 38.02 million to 44.6 million. This was due to continued investment in the company’s Airtel Money agent network, enhanced digital offerings and expanded use cases. Furthermore, the total customer base grew by 8.7 per cent from 152.8 million to 166.1 million. Additionally, data average revenue per user (ARPU) witnessed and increase of 15.4 per cent.
Commenting on the results, Sunil Taldar, chief executive officer, Airtel Africa, said, “We have reported another strong operating performance as our strategy continues to deliver against the significant opportunity that exists across our markets. The focus on our refreshed strategy has seen continued investment in the network while also driving improvements in our digital platforms and offerings to further enhance the customer experience. This has enabled increased digital inclusion with a further 20 per cent growth in our smartphone customers to 74.4 million, contributing to a 47.5 per cent increase in data traffic over the year. Furthermore, Airtel Money continues to support financial inclusion with customers increasing 17.3 per cent to 44.6 million and an expanding ecosystem underpinning the $136 billion transaction value, which increased 32 per cent in constant currency. An improving operating environment and focussed execution contributed to strong momentum in our financial results with constant currency revenue growth peaking at 23.2 per cent in Q4 2024-25. Part of this acceleration in the last quarter has also been driven by the Nigerian tariff adjustments. This accelerating revenue growth and cost optimisation programme has supported quarterly EBITDA margin expansion during the year. Underlying EBITDA margins increased by 200bps from 45.3 per cent in Q1 2024-25 to 47.3 per cent in Q4 2024-25, and we remain focussed on further EBITDA margin improvements subject to macroeconomic stability. This, combined with our robust capital structure and disciplined capital allocation, puts us in a strong position to continue investing in network capacity to deliver continued growth. We are making significant progress in our preparations for the Airtel Money initial public offering (IPO) and remain committed to this objective. However, we are also mindful of evolving market conditions. Therefore, subject to these conditions, we anticipate a listing event in the first half of calendar year 2026. The recent stability in the operating environment is encouraging, however we remain conscious of global developments that may impact our business. We will remain focussed on delivering our strategy to transform the lives of our customers and support economic prosperity across our markets. I want to say a particular thank-you to our customers, partners, governments and regulators for their support and our employees for their unrelenting contribution to the business.”
