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Safaricom Names Peter Ndegwa as the new CEO

Enterprise Team

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Safaricom, the largest telecommunications provider in Kenya and one of the most profitable companies in East and Central Africa region, appointed former East African Breweries Limited (EABL) finance director Peter Ndegwa as the new chief executive on Thursday.

Peter Ndegwa will commence work as the Safaricom’s CEO on the 1st of April 2020. He will also be the first Kenyan to head the largest telco operator in the region.

A statement from the board says Mr Ndegwa joins the telecommunication from Diageo PLC where he is the Managing Director of Diageo Continental Europe.

“Peter oversees the operations of Diageo PLC in 50 countries in Western and Eastern Europe, Russia, Middle East and North Africa region. He had previously served for seven years as CEO in Guinness Nigeria PLC and Guinness Ghana Breweries PLC, where he transformed the two operations to deliver a double- digit growth by investing in people, introducing new brands and reorganizing the businesses,” records the statement.

Preceding to his appointment to the helm of Safaricom, Peter served for 8 years across a range of senior Executive Director roles at EABL (a Diageo subsidiary) based in Nairobi.

“Serving as the Group Chief Finance Officer (CFO), Group Strategy Director, Sales Director, and as an Executive Director on the EABL Board, he was part of the team that saw the EABL business more than doubled in value – and winning the coveted Most Respected Business Award in East Africa for five years in a row,” the board adds.

Peter is to take over from the acting CEO, Michael Joseph, who took up the seat following the demise of the former CEO, Bob Collymore, who battled with cancer but succumbed to it on July 1, 2019.

Safaricom has reported a 14.7%  increase in net profit to Sh63.4 billion for the year ended March 2019. Service revenue grew by 7% to Sh240.3 billion derived largely from outgoing voice calls and Mpesa charges.

Outgoing voice service revenue grew by 0.3% to Sh95.9 billion and Mpesa revenue by 19.2% to Sh74.99 billion.

As mobile data revenue increased by 6.4% to Sh38.69b, its messaging revenue declined by 1.3%  to Sh17.50b which indicates that most people are turning to web-based platforms like WhatsApp to send messages.

Throughout the year, there was a 7.4% increase in the number of customers to 31.8 million, which supported the services revenue of growth of 7.0%.

The board said that they picked on Peter because he is credited with the development of an affordable-beer strategy for EABL resulting in the production of new brands such as Senetor Keg.

Safaricom, which is 35 percent owned by South Africa’s Vodacom, controls about 62 percent of Kenya’s mobile market, with 30 million subscribers.

Britain’s Vodafone has a 5 percent stake and the Kenyan government 35 percent.

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