MTN sells Guinea-Conakry business to Guinean government

South African-headquartered MTN Group has concluded the sale of its operation in Guinea-Conakry to the State of Guinea.

MTN has been planning to exit the West African market for quite some time and said that the deal was made official on December 30, 2024, but did not disclose the size of the deal.  

The pan-African operator said that the transaction aligns with its portfolio optimization and simplification focus that is part of its Ambition 2025 strategy. 

"This milestone marks a new phase for MTN Guinea-Conakry under local ownership, and MTN thanks the staff, customers, regulators and broader stakeholders in Guinea for the support during the time MTN has been operational in the country," MTN Group President and CEO, Ralph Mupita, said in a statement.  

"Concluding this transaction is in line with the strategy to simplify the portfolio and allocating capital to markets where we can make a difference as MTN and deliver long-term growth and returns." Mupita added.

MTN entered the Guinean market in 2007 when it bought the Areeba brand from Lebanese operator Investcom.

MTN's latest quarterly update showed that Guinea-Conakry had just over 3 million subscribers at the end of September 30, 2024.

This is considered a small market when you compare it with the almost 77 million subscribers MTN had in Nigeria over the same period, or its 28.6 million users in Ghana.

Related:MTN's Guinea-Bissau, Guinea-Conakry exits explained

MTN Group President and CEO Ralph Mupita. (Source: MTN Group)

The Guinea-Conakry operation has also provided some headaches for MTN in the past.

In January 2024, MTN's offices in Almamya and Coleah were sealed by the local post and telecommunications regulator over a licensing payment issue.

Back in 2011, MTN also had some troubles in the country to do with its license and Reuters reported that MTN would pay the government of Guinea €15 million ($21.57 million at the time) to resolve the issue.

West African exits

The Guinea-Conakry sale follows MTN's exit from Guinea-Bissau last year as part of a strategy to simplify its portfolio in West Africa and reduce risk.

As part of its half year results published in August 2024, MTN confirmed the sale of its operation in Guinea-Bissau to Telecel Group, following the receipt of all regulatory approvals.

The sale had been in the works since May 2023, when MTN Group said it was considering selling its operations in Guinea-Conakry, Guinea-Bissau and Liberia after receiving an offer from Axian Telecom.

The Axian deal never materialized but at MTN's full year results announcement in March 2024, the group confirmed it had signed a sale and purchase agreement with Telecel for a consideration of US$1 each for the operations in Guinea-Conakry and Guinea-Bissau.

Related:MTN Guinea-Conakry offices sealed by regulator for license fees non-payment

In August 2024, Mupita explained MTN's exit strategy in the two nations telling Connecting Africa that it was moving away from markets that were not able to fund their own growth.

"Given our risk management framework and the things we need, some markets are very difficult. We're not the best owners of those businesses because they're subscale or they're small, and they are not going to be able to fund their own growth," Mupita told Connecting Africa.

"So, Guinea-Conakry and Guinea-Bissau, we looked at them and said, even if they triple their revenue or their profits, are we the best owners of these businesses? And the answer was no, so we said let's engage with third parties," he added.

Originally Liberia was also on MTN's chopping block, but Mupita said that the market is still able to fund its own growth and is a dollarized market that is not asking the group for additional capex.

Middle East exodus

West Africa is not the only region where MTN has been working to simplify its portfolio.

In August 2020, MTN began downsizing its operations in the Middle East.

MTN sold its Yemen business in November 2021, abandoned its operation in Syria in August 2021 and sold its Afghanistan business to M1 Group in February 2024.

MTN's only Middle Eastern operation left is in Iran, where it owns 49% of MTN Irancell as part of a joint venture.

The group also operates in 15 other countries across Africa.