MTN's strategy to focus on expansion in voice, data and mobile financial services has paid off for its Ghana subsidiary.

MTN Ghana has increased its service revenue by 18.8% and increased the number of active subscribers by 6.1% to 18.9 million, according to its unaudited results for the six months ended 30 June 2019.

EBITDA up by 50.3% to GH¢ 1,202 million (up by 23.8% to GH¢ 99 million under IAS 17) and EBITDA margin up by 10.4 percentage points (pp) to 49.5% (up by 1.7 pp to 40.8% under IAS 17).

Capex for the period was GH¢ 803 million (GH¢ 769 million under IAS 17), with interim dividend of GH¢0.02 per share.

In its results posted, MTN Ghana stated: "...smart value propositions and continued improvements made to our network. Data revenue grew 27.7% in a competitive environment and was attributable to an increase in active data users# (+15.0%) and an increased number of smartphones on the network. MTN Mobile Money revenue increased by 53.3% for the six-month period to June 2019 when compared with prior period and was mainly attributable to a higher number of person-to-person (P2P) transactions as well as good growth in more advanced services such as retail merchant payments."

The increase in EBITDA was supported by savings in dealer commissions arising from an increase in electronic airtime sales and lower interconnect costs, according to the company.

MTN Ghana rolled out 280 2G, 557 3G, 900 4G and 100 rural telephony sites as part of its continued network investment.

"2019 is our 'year of the customer' and MTN Ghana will continue to pursue its BRIGHT strategy through the third quarter with the prime focus on customer experience and creating value for shareholders."

It has been reported that MTN is looking to intensify its focus on FinTech and digital services offered via its network. ITWeb reported that the network has over 236 million subscribers across 22 territories.