Kenyan market leader Safaricom booked an 18 per cent year-on-year rise in revenue from its m-Pesa mobile money service during the first half of its fiscal year, with 21 million active users on the platform.

The company reported revenue of KES35.5 billion ($350 million) for m-Pesa in the six month period to the end of September, with 30-day active user numbers up almost 9 per cent on the same period of 2017.

Safaricom said the growth in m-Pesa was partly driven by an increase in users making peer-to-peer payments and a rise in new business customers.

Its agent footprint increased 10 per cent on its previous fiscal H1 to 162,000, more than six-times higher than its nearest mobile money competitor, Communications Authority of Kenya figures showed.

Outside of gains in its mobile money division, the operator reported an 11 per cent rise in mobile data revenue to KES19 billion. Group revenue of KES118 billion was up almost 8 per cent, with net profit of KES31.5 billion 20 per cent higher.

Safaricom CEO Bob Collymore (pictured) said: “We achieved solid results driven by strong m-Pesa gains [and] further diversification of our revenue mix to tap into new growth areas and investment in new revenue streams.”

He added moving forward the company would continue to invest in perceived growth areas including its agriculture management and mobile health platforms, alongside reiterating his aim to export its m-Pesa model to other markets, a strategy first outlined alongside major shareholder Vodacom in 2017.