Safaricom this morning released half year financial results posting an impressive top-line and bottom line mainly driven by M-pesa service revenues.
We had a brief one on one chat with the telco’s CEO Peter Ndegwa and CFO Dilip Pal to talk about the outlook of the company’s newly licensed Ethiopian unit amidst the escalating conflict between the government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) which has left thousands dead, forced over two million people from their homes and pushed parts of the country into famine.
According to Mr Peter Ndegwa, Safaricom has evacuated some of its employees from Ethiopia especially those who were seconded to the country from Kenya. He says the local staff are currently working from home.
Ethiopia Venture Funding
The CFO Mr Dilip Pal mentioned that they have already spent Ksh 3.0 Billion in CAPEX and they expect to spend about Ksh 30.0 Billion in the first year of operations. Over the next five years, they expect to spend about $1.5 Billion to $2.0 Billion.
He further added that the funding options are a mix of debt and equity. He said that they are currently engaging local banks to fund the operations in addition to engaging other development finance institutions (DFIs) such as the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC).
READ; DFC Delays Disbursement of KSh54Billion Loan to Safaricom- led Consortium
