Safaricom's net profit for six months through September rose 20.22 per cent partly helped by revenue from its mobile money service M-Pesa, the giant telco reported Friday.

Profit after taxation hit Ksh31.5 billion ($309.6 million) compared with Ksh26.20 billion ($257.5 million) a year earlier.

The mobile network operator, whose shares trade on Nairobi bourse, earned Ksh35.52 billion ($349.1 million) from globally-leading M-Pesa, an 18.2 per cent jump from Ksh30.05 billion ($295.4 million) a year earlier.

Growth in data services slowed in the period, zooming 10.8 per cent to Ksh19.45 billion ($191.2 million).

Flat voice revenues

Voice revenues were nearly flat, increasing 1.4 per cent year-on-year to Ksh48.03 billion ($472.1 million).

Growth in messaging revenue was equally flat, growing 1.2 per cent to Ksh8.82 billion ($86.7 million), while fixed services income jumped 21 per cent to Ksh3.91 billion ($38.4 million).

"I’m pleased with the progress we made on a number of fronts in the first half of the year. We achieved solid results driven by strong M-Pesa gains, further diversification of our revenue mix to tap into new growth areas and investment in new revenue streams, which contributed to a double digit increase in Earnings Per Share (EPS), and free cash flow," chief executive Bob Collymore said.

"We accomplished all this while sustaining investment in our network, which saw us invest Ksh17 billion ($167.1 million) in the first half of the year driven by increased network roll out and acceleration of broadband and fibre deployment. "