Safaricom PLC Announces Unaudited Results for the 6 Months Ended 30th September 2019

Safaricom PLC CEO Michael Joseph responds to a question during the Safaricom Half Year results announcement at the Michael Joseph Centre

Michael Joseph, Safaricom PLC Interim CEO commented:

Our top priority for the first half of this year continues to be our customers, specifically regaining their trust and in the process growing our market share. I am pleased to advise that we have witnessed improved customer sentiments through measures such as NPS and brand consideration and a market share increase for the first time since 2017.

We have always believed that investment in our network and infrastructure is a key to success, and continue to invest ahead of the curve. In the first half of this year, we accelerated our 4G rollout as promised, adding an additional 732 sites in the period, a growth of 50% year on year and reaching 63% coverage as we strive to cover every town in Kenya by the end of the year.

We also continue to accelerate our digital transformation and agile agenda. We believe our continued focus on digital engagement with customers will enable us to enhance and simplify our customer service offerings.

Looking ahead, the innovation pipeline looks promising. We will sustain the momentum of investing in the quality of our service and growth in our portfolio including deeper penetration of M-PESA into the economy, cloud and IoT solutions, our agricultural and e-commerce platforms, regional expansion and new business opportunities.

News Release

We remain committed to our purpose of transforming lives, integrating the Sustainable Development goals into everything we do. We continue to support maternal and educational projects, and economic empowerment for the youth.

As I announced last week, we are making a commitment to be Simple, Transparent and Honest in everything we do as demonstrated by the launch of our simplified plans and customer journey. This is a total transformation of how we do business, and while there may be some impact in the short-term, we believe it is the right thing to do to ensure the long-term sustainability of this company. We hope you are as excited as we are and look forward to welcoming some of you back to the Safaricom family.

Summary and outlook

We are pleased with the strong results we have delivered for first half of FY20 and we remain confident that we shall attain our full year guidance, building on our long track record of consistent delivery, protecting shareholder wealth and putting the customer first.