Vodacom Group, a leading telecommunications company led by South African tycoon Shameel Joosub, has completed the acquisition of a 55-percent controlling stake in Vodafone Egypt, Egypt’s largest mobile network operator by active subscribers.
The completion of the deal, which ends the long-delayed sale after Saudi-based operator group STC expressed interest two years ago, comes nearly a year after Vodacom received shareholder approval for the R48.1-billion ($2.7 billion) transaction.
The acquisition of the majority stake in Vodafone Egypt provides significant diversification and growth opportunities for Vodacom Group and its shareholders as it embarks on a strategic transformation into a tech-holding company.
As part of its efforts to integrate the operations of its newly acquired subsidiary, Vodacom stated that it expects to consolidate the Egypt unit into its financial statements over the remainder of the current fiscal year.
Vodacom Group CEO Shameel Joosub stated that the transaction represents an important milestone for Vodacom Group because it will cement the company’s position as a leading pan-African technology company while also diversifying and accelerating its growth profile.
“We will seek to leverage our financial services product roadmap, including our super-app approach, to accelerate Vodafone Egypt’s financial services opportunity,” Joosub said, adding that the group also sees upside from cross-pollination between Vodafone Egypt’s software factory and Vodacom Group’s big data capabilities, as well as closer cooperation between both companies by scaling pan-African enterprise and IoT scalability.
Vodacom Group Limited is a South African telecommunications company that serves over 129.9 million customers with voice, messaging, data, and converged services.
Under the leadership of Joosub, the group has grown its operations to include networks in Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mozambique, and Lesotho.
At the time of writing, shares in the telecommunications company were trading at R129.22 ($7.54) per share, giving it a market capitalization of R238 billion ($13.9 billion), ranking it 14th on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
