Good morning, good afternoon, good evening from wherever you're joining us from, and Happy New Year. In Kenya, after the turn of the year, if you haven't seen or talked to somebody, you still wish them a Happy New Year the moment you see them or talk to them, regardless of the time or date in the year. In fact, we say it's up to the thirty-first of January. So once again, Happy New Year and karibu. So welcome to our Safaricom Ethiopia quarterly update call, where we'll be briefing you on the business performance of our operations in Ethiopia and the progress that we have made to date as at Q3. My name is Caroline Wambugu. I'm the Head of Investor Relations and Financial Planning Analysis here at Safaricom, and I'll be moderating today's call. We also are joined by our CEO, Peter Ndegwa, who will make introductory remarks, followed by our CFO, Dilip Pal, who will also share a brief overview. Thereafter, we shall open up the session to field your questions. Before we kick off the session, I would like to speak to some housekeeping rules. Please ensure you have joined the session in your full names for ease of identification when you post your questions or comments. If you haven't done so, right now, you can just rename yourself by hovering the cursor over your name and clicking rename on the dropdown. Throughout this session, any questions you have for the leadership team, you should share them via the Q&A tab, and at the end of the question, kindly please remember to include your organization's name. In staying committed with our promise on diversity and inclusion, a live transcript has also been made available for the comfort of anyone with hearing difficulties who has joined the call. You can access this by clicking the View Transcript tab at the bottom of your Zoom application under More, and then click Show Captions. This will allow you to keep up with the conversations in a more comfortable manner. And finally, and in case you require any assistance from us that is not related to the discussion at hand, you can write to us via the chat platform, and the investor relations team will be on hand to assist you from the back end. I now welcome our CEO, Peter, to give his introductory remarks. Peter, over to you. Yeah. Thank you. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, everyone. Caroline, please confirm that you can hear me. Yes, we can hear you, Peter. Yeah, and, and, like Caroline, although I'm not allowed to say to some people, I'll say Happy New Year to everyone, given that I've, actually not, probably seen many of you. Delighted to be able to, to be talking to you at this stage. I know we, we had, quite a few conversations around, October, November, and in some cases even in, in December. And I know we talked about various things. Ethiopia, was a big topic, and we promised that every quarter we will be, speaking to you. We're also delighted that, we are going to be hosting investors, physically in Ethiopia, sometime in February, which I think Caroline, too, at the end of this, briefing, will, actually talk about it. We are really looking forward to it. We believe that it will start to bring to life the kind of economy, the kind of country Ethiopia is, for those who may not have been there, but also the kind of business that that we are building. And to Dilip's point, he says that you'll also be able to see towers, that they really exist. I'm sure you'll come for more than just that, but we are really looking forward to that. It is also an opportunity, and I was speaking to some of the government of Ethiopia senior people, for them to also talk to you about their perspectives about the economy, and some of the issues that sometimes you ask us as Safaricom. In terms of, since the half-year results, we continue to see momentum. Of course, there are some elements that are not negative, which we'll talk about, but also, we see positive momentum in terms of the business side. We continue to roll out our sites across the country. In particular, we believe that we'll be close to the targets that we set out at the beginning or even at the half-year stage. There are some challenges that we'll share with you, in particular in places like Amhara, which at the moment have a state of emergency. So we've paused the rolling out of sites and also even to some extent, the commercialization of some of those sites. So we'll be able to share that with you. We are seeing some progress on M-PESA. On the GSM side, we are considering improving our route to consumer, which will be a new distribution framework, which will be launched in a week or two from now, which should also give us a bit more momentum. On the macro side, clearly, it's a challenging time for many economies, not least in Ethiopia, and I'm sure Dilip will give you some KPIs, but you're also familiar with some of the challenges, especially around inflation, and also currency and debt. But we remain committed to the long-term potential of Ethiopia as a country, and we continue to drive our commercial execution, and we'll be sharing some of that and the results that we are seeing to date. So, Caroline, I'll hand over back to you, or direct to Dilip. Thank you very much, Peter, for those opening remarks. Let me also acknowledge the presence of our CEO from Safaricom Ethiopia, who is also on the call, as I hand over to Dilip for an overview. Dilip, over to you. Thank you, Caroline. Confirm, you can hear me well? Yes, we can hear you, Dilip. You may proceed. Okay. And thanks, Peter, for the opening remarks, and welcome everyone. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening. I will say I hope your new year started well, and I'm very, very pleased to host you today in our quarterly call, as Peter mentioned, which we have started in this financial year. For Q3 update, we have released a report this afternoon. Hope you got a chance to look at that. This necessarily gives an update about our Ethiopia business up to December. Now, I also do not want to miss an opportunity, I'm sure Caroline probably will speak about that, but I still want to entice you to come and join us for the two days investors roadshow that we have on 22nd and 23rd February in Addis. We actually have seen very encouraging registration, and the registration is still open. Please, make yourself available as much as you can. Yeah, I thought I'll also probably take this opportunity to tell you that, beyond business, of course, which we'll do, which is our main objective, but you will have an opportunity to participate in a wellness run with our CEO and also Ethiopia's greatest athlete. So I hope that also gives you enough motivation to come and join for the Ethiopia roadshow. Now, back to Quarter 3 commercial updates. I'll try to be brief and probably allow questions, answers. Now, it's been 1 year and 3 months that we are in operations, in commercial operation. To our credit, we have actually registered about 9 million gross adds in Ethiopia. Our 90-day active customers now stands at about 4.3 million. Yeah, at the end of FY 2023, we had half of that. I also wanted to highlight that this quarter, as you'd recall, we mentioned about in our half-yearly call around August, there was an emergency declared in Amhara region, which is a significant part of our business. As Peter mentioned, that we needed to stop rollout and also the business activities got impacted greatly. That also required some of the services not being available to the customer. So that actually impacted our net additions during this period. So we are now available in 33 cities with 2,242 sites. In terms of our own build versus co-location, we are about 44% co-location with Ethio Tel. Happy to share that one of the regions which was greatly impacted earlier, which is Tigray region, has started following the peace treaty, and we are anticipating that we should be able to roll out or fast-track the rollout in that region as well. Now, coming to the more specific around commercial activities in terms of usage and revenue. Mobile data, as usual, continues to be the growth driver. We have seen increase in usage, and of course, we have seen increase in growth in ARPU as well as revenue. Especially on the usage side, which is something we are very encouraged by an average usage of 3.7 GB, with December exit at 4.8 GB. Given that we are just about one year, three months into operations, having this achievement is quite sizable. As you know, we also launched M-PESA, and since mid-August, and it's just about 4.5 months, we have registered around 3.1 million customers. We, from an M-PESA point of view, we are now interoperable with nine banks, and mostly all big banks are part of our ecosystem in M-PESA. And we have... We are offering deposits with dual transfers, airtime purchase, and also data package purchase through M-PESA, and also M-PESA to bank and bank to M-PESA, merchant payments with transacting tills, and also international money remittance services. So you would have probably seen, I don't want to go more detail into it. You have seen the key KPIs that we have shared in the newsletter that we have given. Especially on the M-PESA side, you've seen now we are... You know, these are still small, but you're now beginning to see showing up in revenues. Overall revenue, we have KES 3.5 billion in service revenue for the period, with M-PESA contributing about KES 45 million. Mobile data contributes about 71% of the revenue, which is very encouraging, and ARPU, which is close to now KES 200 from increased usage. And we have seen quarter-over-quarter, we've seen the half year give us nine months, the improvement in the ARPU profile driven by usage. Now, lastly, on the macro side of the things, macro continues to be challenging, although I'd say that GDP projection or growth projection is about 6.2% in 2024, is one of the probably one of the best in this region, which is good. The currency continues to depreciate. The difference between official and unofficial rate still remains high. Inflation remained below 30%, since June 2023, which is good, but it's still quite high, as you know, it's like 28.7% in December 2023 from a November base of November of 28.3%. So it's like it's below 30%, but it's not coming down further. As I mentioned, Amhara region is still under a state of emergency. There has been restriction in business activity in that region, and we have seen impact coming through in the second half of the current financial year. Now I won't get more details into it. Probably allow question and answers at this point in time. I want to pause and open the floor for questions, and back to Caroline for Q&A. Thank you. Thank you very much, Dilip. I'm now looking at the Q&A tab, so feel free to post your questions on the Q&A tab so that we can interact further with the report that was shared with you, today. I also see requests for the report. Let's see whether we can try and also share it here for ease of access for some of those that probably, did not quite get it, but, we shall be able to do that. So now we have, questions from, Tracy. Tracy, thanks for your questions. So, speak about... So please speak to Safaricom. Hold on, hold on. Speak to Safaricom's handset strategy in Ethiopia, the technological part, the technology partners, the average cost to the customer, repayment periods, and amount of devices, disbursed. So that's a question from Tracy. I'll give that to you, Dilip. The handset strategy in Ethiopia. Yeah, this is where I would seek Wim's help. Wim, if you can speak through a couple of key points on the handset side, because that's part of the key strategy around our mobile data proposition in Ethiopia. And given that 70% or more than 70% of revenue comes from mobile data, of course, the device's smartphone becomes a very integral part of the strategy. So Wim, maybe a few quick reflections from your side on the handset strategy. Okay. Good afternoon. I hope I'm audible. Yeah, can you confirm? You are. Okay. Yes. Yes. Okay, good afternoon. So concerning the device strategy, for the moment, we are focusing, I would say, on the more traditional way of pushing handsets in the trade through our existing sales channels, our existing footprint of about 180 shops that we have now. Those are just the traditional devices that we have in most markets. What we haven't fully embarked on yet, and which is a major initiative for the next few months, is that we will start doing proper device financing. So today, we are just buying and reselling through our existing retail footprint, a number of devices. I mean, you've seen the figures in terms of the revenue. So those are the traditional devices at $50 or $100 price points. But the real game changer for us in terms of the data strategy is when we will start embarking on device financing, which is quite imminent in the next few months. And that should enable us to really tap into customers who cannot afford necessarily the data device, but that we will offer them through the device financing. Thank you, Wim. Yeah, thanks for that, Wim. Another very interesting question here from from Tracy again, of SBG. So, and this is to you, Dilip. Ethiopia data uptick has been very impressive. Are there any lessons on data consumption in Ethiopia that are transferable to the Kenyan market? That one is very smart question, Tracy. Actually, you know what, what's happening is this is what we are, you know, motivating our, the Kenya teams that, see, in 1 year and 3 months, in 15 months flat, Ethiopia has beaten Kenya in terms of the data usage growth. So that's the story. But to be fair, and to be more, give credit to the team, Kenya team, I mean, they continue to learn from what they're doing. I think important part is that, there was a latent demand in that country, in Ethiopia, and the network that we have built is a network for mobile data. So it is quite clear, that the choice of the customers, as far as, Ethiopia, Safaricom Ethiopia network is concerned, is clearly relying on their data. So in terms of our proposition, in terms of our experience, I think we managed to do very well there. But also remember that we are still, you know, as I said, we've covered 33, you know, about 33% of population. We have still not gone into interior, as opposed to Kenya, where we have covered quite well. But I know for sure that the team is not going to stay on the- ... On the, you know, in the, in the, in the, the usage. Yes, Stanley, can you go on mute, please? Yeah. So, I think the challenge is for also to Ethiopia to sustain and grow from the level they are today. And challenge to the Kenya team is that it is possible you have a bit—if you have a good network, you have the good proposition and the use cases, the data, mobile data continues to grow. So yeah, we take those challenge very seriously and, you know, try to motivate each other to make sure that we keep on growing. And on the Kenya side also, you see very good momentum on mobile data. Thank you. Thank you very much for that, Dilip. Let me position a question here from Parin to you, Peter. Do you still expect a third operator coming into the country? And if there is no third operator in the future, how does this affect your cost and profitability projections? Yeah. I think, look, in terms of the third operator, that is, of course, the decision for the Ethiopian government. If you speak to them, they still believe that they are going to sell a stake in Ethio Tel and also attract a third operator. Clearly, the timing has not been right, given the macroeconomic environment, the funding considerations, and so on and so forth. And therefore, in our view, this is not government's view, in our view, it is unlikely that a third operator will come in in the next two years. Because they will still have to start to restart the process. They'll have to choose the right moment. They'll have to make sure that the elements that the third operator will look at in terms of progress in the country are ticked off before they actually, they then go into the market. In terms of the third operator coming in, I think the positive side is we can share towers. We can actually ensure that the regulatory environment is truly international. When you are three players, it's much easier to ensure that the regulatory environment is best in class. Of course, we will then... It will also mean that we do have a third competitor, which is not necessarily a bad thing, because we had considered it when we went into the country. So in many ways, we don't believe that a third operator coming in is actually a disadvantage from a competitive perspective. But then also the next two years gives us an opportunity to have progressed our commercial momentum as we await for the role that either an Ethio Tel, owned by an international player or a third operator will have in the future. Thank you. Thank you very much, Peter. A couple of questions here from Rohit Modi. And And I'll position this to you, Dilip. Let's maybe start with the first one here. Are you still witnessing higher price competition in the market? And please, could you indicate if it's for voice or data or across services? Yeah. Thank you, Modi, for the question. The market is very competitive, so the price. I think we've spoken about price correction by the competitor. I think in few tranches, which they continue to do. From an intensity point of view, I won't say that what we have discussed in the first half, after the first half results release, that it has not gone, it has not gone worse as far as pricing is concerned, but it has not gone better either. So you could almost say that we have seen significant price erosion, from the time even before we launched and then after launch. But I would consider the last quarter, which is what we are talking about today, is probably more stability, from a pricing point of view. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip, for that. The other question from Modi still is: please, could you share more details around the terms for the deferred vendor payments? What is the average maturity period, and how much of this is dollar-denominated, and what kind of interest it carries? Yeah. So I think the deferred payment terms are, in general, its average tenure is 2 years, but it does allow us an opportunity also to roll over beyond 2 years, if needed. So it has that flexibility. The actual tenure. We did mention about this in the past, that this was one of the terms you know that are very, very favorable to us because this was negotiated as part of our equipment deal with the vendor. So it was not a separate negotiation of the deferred payment. This was part of the integral part of the overall vendor selection and the payment process. So very, very attractive, you know, you know, from the point of view of. It's much lower. You can almost say the average rate of interest would be half of what you would probably pay for a commercial debt that what we normally take from the market. So very, very, very attractive. It has flexibility, even to roll over beyond 2 years, but average tenure is about 2 years. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip. A question here on the currency depreciation case from Lynette of Absa. And this is to Dilip. So please give guidance on the implied D-KES exchange rate. With the gap between the official and parallel rate and Ethiopia's non-payment of its Eurobond coupon payment, what does this mean for Safaricom's elevated translation risk? And how will management cushion the consolidated financials against a likely Birr devaluation? Yeah, Lynette, that's a very good question. First, if you have seen in the newsletter that you have provided, the data book that you have provided, the birr did depreciate, but at much slower pace than one would have expected. So depreciation to date was about 4.8%. Now, I want to frame this, the risk in two phases on currency. Now, our foreign currency exposure at this point in time is in the form of, you know, the debt that we have taken, which is, for example, we have taken debt from IFC, and then also the deferred vendor payment. I think there was this question around... I think it's mostly in dollar, very, very little amount in euro, so it's mostly in dollar. That is the biggest element. So remember, the way we are trying to manage it now is the $1.6 billion of investment, out of which $1 billion is the license fee that we have paid. So $600 million dollar equivalent that has come into the business, it has come in the foreign currency, right? So, and we were allowed to pay mostly out of offshore through the Franco Valuta route, which is what allows us to have offshore account and then pay from there. So to that extent, you know, there is... The money came in dollar or mostly in hard currency, and the payment to the vendor is also happening to the vendor to that extent. On the second phase is when we reach to a point where we have to now, you know, when we have cash flow surplus. Okay, the second part is... Sorry, there are three elements. The second part is the local currency. So local currency debt that we are taking is primarily to take care of the local payments. So that's what. So foreign currency debt is mostly for the money that is coming mostly for the foreign payments. Local currency is mostly towards local payment. And then third phase is when we have the surplus, the question becomes more of availability of the currency to be able to convert and then pay, you know, be outside of Ethiopia for the foreign currency-denominated payments. That's what we are banking on two things. One, the currency liberalization program that government started, which have, of course, has taken a back seat. Obviously, I think this has gone worse than it was before. And then the other part is that even if the currency is available, are we able to prioritize telecom payments as part of the pay, priority payment, given telecom is a essential service? I think our current focus is, or priorities are to get the regulator to accept telecom as a priority sector, and then allow conversion with that, rather than, you know, putting it under lowering the priority and not able to get the currency that we need. On currency translation, we do evaluate that all the time. And you probably, you know, see that in terms of our translation, so the, the ETB to... Because ultimately, we're reporting in PLC, in the, in Kenyan shilling currency. So we do recognize the currency losses because of the- even if ETB is not, even if ETB is not depreciating, but compared to dollar, shilling depreciated much faster, you know, 20% plus versus 4%. I think we do recognize that losses in the consolidated financials. But to be- I mean, this is something that is probably the number one issue that we are dealing with, apart from everything else that, the, as part of the risk that I think you are aware of. The currency continues to be the key focus area, and we haven't seen much progress on this ever since we started our operations there. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip. A couple of questions here from Sila of EFG, and I think a number of them have been answered, speaking to the competitive environment and the third operator license. But there's one on M-PESA agents, and this is to you, Dilip. Are the M-PESA agents in Ethiopia exclusive to Safaricom? Yeah. Maybe it will be good to frame the question slightly differently, Sila. If I may ask you, if you can define what you mean by exclusivity? You know, are you referring in the context of how Kenya operates? As you recall, Kenya, the agents are not exclusive. Actually, they are allowed to have, you know, business beyond M-PESA. If that is the question, I think then it's a very different thing, and I don't know what exclusivity you meant by that. But we, I think the agency, as far as I know, maybe you can confirm back, they have other lines of business, and then they can also do M-PESA. So, Wim, can I just ask you to confirm that if that is what the exclusivity- Yes, yes, Dilip, absolutely, I confirm. So the whole M-PESA agents are on a non-exclusive basis, so our agents can be agents of competition and vice versa. Yeah. There's no exclusivity in the trade. Which is similar to what we have in Kenya. Kenya also has the same thing. It used to be exclusive, but it became, I think that became, you know, part of- you know, this became available. This agency became available to the competition as well. Great. Thank you. Thank you for that, Dilip. Question here from Jacqueline. This is to you, Peter. How has the Eurobond default affected Safaricom or the country's prospects moving forward? Just repeat that, how has? How has the Eurobond default affected Safaricom or the country prospects moving forward? Yeah. If you, if you speak to the Ethiopian government, they will tell you that they have not defaulted. So I think it depends on who you speak to. The government says they want to treat various bondholders in the same way. But of course, the narrative is not great. They believe that they can be able to resolve the issue in the next few months. I think we'll just have to wait and see how they resolve this matter. But from the perspective of giving confidence, of course, the headlines are not great. In terms of how the issue is eventually resolved, that's what will determine the future and how everyone looks at Ethiopia. Thank you. Thank you very much, Peter. A question here from Francis of Kestrel. So this is to you, Dilip. If you could give us an update on MTR discussions, and then secondly, speak about whether Ethiopia qualifies for investment tax credit, and what percentage of the investment value and for how long? That is on the investment tax credits. Caroline, repeat MTR, and then? MTR discussions, and then does Ethiopia qualify for investment tax credits? What percentage of the investment value, and for how long? Okay. So starting with MTR, Francis, what we have updated to all of you in the past is there was an what you call that intermediate determination of an MTR rate, which is what we are currently applying, and with an understanding and confirmation from the regulator that a proper cost study will be performed, and then that will become the basis for a long-term MTR roadmap. So this... We understand that the work was completed in quarter three, and there was a report was expected to be released anytime soon, but we haven't had the report released yet. But expectation is that it, the work got done and that there would be a report. And our also best-case expectation is that it's lower than what it is today. You know, that's very important for a new business to set up where most of the calls would go to the other operator. And then, if MTR is not at the level where we can be competitive in the market, I think it puts us in a bit of a backseat. So the work was done, and we expect the regulator to share the study report, and then therefore, a long-term framework on MTR soon. And, if we have any information around that, we'll not wait for the call. We'll definitely let all the investors and analysts know about what has happened on this. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip. The other question- Sorry. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. The other question was investment. Yes. I think the biggest benefit that we have is on the customs duty relief, as part of our capital goods input, which is, which is what is actually a major relief for us. And then there are certain tax holidays, with a certain year limitation of the investment. So, you know, at an appropriate time, we can also give you a little bit more details around what those are or that there is in the positive. But I think the biggest relief is the customs duty relief on imported telecommunication goods. Thank you. Thank you for that, Dilip. Moving on to a couple of questions from Madi. So I'll pick a few from there. So Madi is asking: How is our cost control given the high inflation in Ethiopia, and at what point do you think it will start becoming an issue? So that is on the cost aspect. The second piece is on comparators, you know, like comparatives for the network quality, whether there are any network quality KPIs available between us and Safaricom Ethiopia and Ethio Telecom, besides coverage, and how we think the network stands in terms of download speeds, pricing, distribution, recharge cards. So it's more like comparative data between us and Ethio Telecom with respect to some network KPIs, if we have any that we could share. That is from Madi of HSBC. Yeah. Thank you, Madi, for this question, and this is where probably I will seek a bit of help from Wim, on this. But as far as we know, there is not a lot of publicly published data available for Ethio Telecom. So many of this information, what is available is through the what you call that market intelligence and also some of the studies that we have done before, including, if I'm not mistaken, it was Ookla. Actually, Ookla declared Ethiopia our Safaricom Ethiopia network is the best network in Ethiopia. Not only in Ethiopia, but entire Africa in terms of the download speed. But that's quite, that's quite obvious and quite natural, given that we are a brand new operations. From a specific comparisons, I don't know whether, Wim, you have any comparisons to give is available, but we know for sure that the customer feedback is very, very good in terms of the, if you see, and also some of the other things like OpenSignal and other. The download speed, the quality of the data, the internet browsing is much better. So, maybe, Wim, you can also cover from the cost control point of view, given the price levels that we are. You know, what are some of the areas that we are looking at? And that's something that we are very keen because the price levels are there where we are. The customers are going to pay you what the price levels are in the market. Obviously, we need to make sure that the cost supports that level of pricing. So, Wim, very quick on anything- Okay, so the things Dilip, on the quality of the network, of course, our value proposition in the market is very much focused around data and quality data. We do have a few independent sources. You've mentioned Ookla. There's also Facebook and others that publish. And of course, we have our internal statistics. We do drive tests all the time, and we do comparative drive tests, you put both networks. Of course, that is for internal consumption, but the bottom line of it is the same consistently. Also based on, you know, customer feedback, is that our data quality is really better than our competitor, based on our own data and also based on customer confirmation, and that is what we drive in the market as our key value proposition. Both in terms of, you know, indoor quality, download speed, and others. There's a consensus in the market that we are definitely superior, which of course also, to relate it, we have a completely new network, and we're just in the building and the ramp-up phase. So, which would I say, obvious that we are by far the better quality network. Stanley, CFO, maybe you can comment a bit on the inflation and the cost control. Yeah. Obviously, as when we realized that the pricing is not to what we were expecting and is not likely to change, we did a review of our cost base. And as a result of that, we've actually already implemented quite a bit of the actions which are necessary, and especially on the network side, to be able to get to a good place, from our. And to mitigate some of the pricing challenges. Part of that is done, part of it is ongoing. And the biggest part is obviously to be ahead of the curve, such that if there is a devaluation, you have most of your local services in local currency. So those kind of works and, so localizing, insourcing, where possible, even relooking at the structure of the organization, while still keeping the, the mantra of quality data, top of mind. All that has already happened and some of the things have already been delivered, some of the things are in flight, and, we have factored that within our expectations. So we'll continue having a very tight rein on control of cost because, that we believe that from a -- although ARPU is where we think we have been in terms of ARPU, our expectation is that possibly that, we are at the lowest it will be. But the main, main, main thing is that we still have to work on cost, especially for the future sustainability of the business. Yeah, and Kara, if you allow me on a lighter note, I would say to the investors, let's... We are waiting for you in Addis next month, and then you can live the experience of our very, very good and fast data network yourselves. So we're looking forward to that. Indeed. Thank you. Thank you very much for that, Wim. I'm looking forward to have you guys come and test it for yourselves in Ethiopia. So thank you. Thank you also for the answers, together with Stanley, our CFO, most appreciated. Dilip, I'll take two further questions here. One from Mishra and a related one from Jonty Fish. So for Mishra, the question is: How is funding situation in Ethiopia, and do you expect to raise more debt in near term? But we can combine it with a CapEx question from Jonty Fish, and the question is: Do you plan to put more money in Ethiopia, or has most of the CapEx been funded already? Yeah. So I think, as you said, both are, both are quite linked. In terms of funding, if you have seen the data pack that we have shared, YTD December, we have put in $1.6 billion, out of which $1 billion is towards the license fee, that $850 million GSM and then 150 for the mobile financial services license that we have paid. Beyond that is about $600 million. So to your question that what is okay, beyond that, what we have done? We have also have deferred payment from the vendor, the equipment vendor, and then we do have local the ETB-denominated loan, which is about in excess of about $100 million. So other than... Sorry, and then about $100 million from, as in debt from, IFC. So beyond that, what we have put in as mostly the money which has come through equity. Now, to your questions, what, what do you need? So we have spoken about our CapEx of anything between, you know, the peak period of investment that we call is the first five years. So overall investment about $1.5 billion-$2 billion. And towards that, we believe from a contribution from shareholder towards equity will be minimum. For the rest of the funding that is required, the requirement would be more met through a debt. We did mention about when we did the deal with IFC, both for equity about $157 million and debt of $100 million, that it allows us to opportunity to even go beyond as we need it. So the answer is, yes, we need more, we need more debt funding. And the quantum will be determined by the speed of CapEx that we are able to do within the first five years. That's why it is a range what I have spoken about. And objective is to make sure that we maximize debt, and then we also remain within the, you know, the debt equity prudential norms that the National Bank of Ethiopia has put in also. But if you recall, the money has mostly gone through equity, so we are now adding the further funding requirement through debt. Thank you. Thank you very much, Dilip. We take a question here from Maurice Patrick of Barclays, and the question is: Can you explain the extent of cooperation with Ethio Telecom? Because of the 2,200 or so sites, I see almost half are collocated. So should we assume a similar rate going forward? And the second part of the question is: Are all issues with interconnection of voice, SMS, data resolved? So that's two questions there from Maurice. Yeah. Thank you, Maurice. I'll start with the MTR first, which is what I've given update, I think, to a very specific question. Otherwise, you are talking about interconnect, meaning you're talking about mobile termination rates. So, mobile termination rates applicable for voice and messaging. Of course, data doesn't attract any mobile termination. So, from an interconnect point of view, you are, we are connected with Ethio Telecom because, you know, you can't run a business without having connected with the on the operator, other operator that we have. Now, are we satisfied with the rate? That's what I was mentioning. The rate which was agreed, which is still applicable, is the rate which was... We call that as intermediate rate, in absence or in waiting for a final rate coming from the cost study, which should be coming in, as per the because the work has now been completed. So I think that from an interconnection point of view, if the commercial is the rate which is yet to be agreed or yet to be to the level of expectations that we have, otherwise there is no other issue on that. Now, coming to co-location. You are right. Co-location drives major part of our capital efficiency in Ethiopia, and that was part of our understanding as well. In the beginning, when there was conversation around licensing of tower company in Ethiopia, which didn't happen, the alternate solution, which was brought in by the regulator. There is a difference because regulator brought in and made it mandatory for operators to share their infrastructure, which includes towers. You know, Ethio Telecom was obligated to share their infrastructure with us to enable our rollout. Now, I think we have updated our investors and analysts over a long period of time. We have initially there was a lot of teething issues. It took a lot of time to finalize the agreement because as long as it is allowed by the regulator to have the co-location, the commercial terms still needed to be finalized between two operators, which took a time, but once we finalized that, it started the momentum. Now, if you're asking that, whether it is likely to continue, yes, I think colocation is an important and key element of our strategy in terms of capital efficiency. I can't say that it is smooth. We do face challenges as much as there is obligation, and there is also intent to do it, but when it comes to grassroots level of actual colocation, we do face challenges. The other challenges is in terms of quite a large section of their infrastructure are not up to standard, they are not modernized, so that takes much longer. So then, because of scarcity of dollar, it takes for them a longer time to modernize those sites. The pace is probably what could be faster than what you're experiencing. But if your question is that, is this something that we bank on in future? Yes, we do bank on Ethio Telecom co-location in future. So long, there is no entry of, what you call the tower company licensing in Ethiopia. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip, for that. Mariana, I see a question around ARPU from a calculations perspective. Maybe just to confirm the numbers in the report that has been shared exclude hyperinflationary input, so that's on the revenue part. So just confirming that for the benefit of all of us. A few questions here from Tracy. So Tracy, and this is to you, Dilip. Will Safaricom still retain its target of 7 million active customers by end of this financial year, considering the moderation in subscription growth in this third quarter? Dilip, maybe you can take that, then I'll read some more. Yeah. Okay. Tracy, thank you for that question, and, as you have seen that, when we were guiding... Of course, we revised down our guidance from 10 to 7 million. At the time of guidance, you know, we-- the conflict or the emergency started around August. So we were still hoping that, this is not going to linger, as much as what we are seeing now. And that has created, a significant, loss of momentum in the way we are adding more customers. So it's not just about adding more customers. It's almost like 20% of our, you can say 20% of business sites were residing in Amhara region. So it's just not about adding more customers, adding more sites, adding more gross adds. It's also about customers who are not able to utilize use because of some of the restrictions which has been put on as part of the emergency. So it's a. It's almost, you can say, double whammy. We are not adding more gross adds, and we also start seeing many of them becoming inactive. So in our calculation, when we started guiding for a 7 million, at that time, we are, we are hoping that at least even if there is a slowdown on gross adds, but we would be able to keep those customers active because they will start using. Now, right at this point in time, I mean, it's you see the numbers, and we are about 4.3, and the target is 3 million, which is like more than what we have done so far in this year. So looks quite challenging, and I think in terms of giving... Okay, do I expect it to be lower than 7 million? I think it will be lower than 7 million. Where do we land? What-- How much it would be shortfall? I think that's something that we are working out, and one of the things that we'll probably try and do is giving you a bit more color when we do the investor roadshow in February. But it is expected that 7 million is a very stressed target, based on what we have seen, in the, you know, the disrupted environment in Amhara. So, Caroline, you can go to the next question. Yes, the next question is still from Tracy. It's on Safaricom's target for M-PESA registered users in this FY. And, you can combine that with the other question around still M-PESA, but on take rates. And, the question is: How do you see the M-PESA take rates currently compared to Kenya when it launched in 2007? Will it be much cheaper, and how does the M-PESA take rate compare to Telebirr's, Dilip? Yeah. So Tracy, I think, my suggestion would be that you, I mean, we don't spend a lot of time in looking at the take rate at this point in time, you know, in just four months of our operation. Right now, we mean the team is actually focusing on building the infrastructure. So we are in that build phase of expanding agents, signing the merchants and making sure that we build use cases. So we have, as I mentioned, there is, you know, deposits, withdrawal, transfer, you know, the merchant's payments. All of these things are available. And the transactions are... There is a lot of trial happening at this point in time. We want to make sure that we have a reasonable base of customers before we start talking about take rate. So take rate, you know, you see that you have a revenue about KES 45 million, and then you see also transaction is very easy for you. It's very low at this point in time because there is a lot of trial happening. You know, till you get into a point where you have a reasonable size of the customers who are now experiencing and, the what you call, there is a network effect, right? So that, that's what I would say. And from a... I think you cannot compare Kenya, Kenya of 2008. And if you recall, Kenya, M-PESA was launched 7-8 years after the GSM was kind of, you know... GSM was launched before, but when it became Safaricom, right? Around 2000. But the things are very different when it, you know, it was not known. M-PESA was not known, in Kenya anyway. You know, forget about Kenya, I think that concept that this can solve customer problem didn't exist. There was a lot of efforts which were required in educating customers what this means. Now, is this required in Ethiopia? Maybe it is still required, but not to the extent. This product knowledge about what it can do is fairly available in the market, and also given that Telebirr has launched before us, which also... and given the registered numbers, although I would say activity level is still low, which means that there is a reasonable understanding and acceptance and education about the M-PESA ecosystem, what it can do to the consumers. And that's why you see, I mean, these numbers, although you can say it's still small, but from a registered customer's point of view, 3 million registered customers in such a short period of time, of course, we haven't achieved in Kenya. I mean, if I just compare back, what we did in 2000, when we launched in 2008. I think a lot depends on when you get into a scale. So this business, please understand, is still in that build phase. This business is still under, in that, you know, looking for that sweet spot, what is that network effect will start coming in, backed by GSM customers, which allows us now to then ride on and then allow, M-PESA, to ride with use cases which you believe customers in Ethiopia find more attractive. So it just cannot just copy-paste from Kenya. But right now, the traction looks okay. If I, you know, if I leave aside the Amhara situation, I think on the customer side, in the rest of the territories, the rest of the regions, I think we're doing quite fairly well. And we are still looking for those sweet spot through the trial and, you know, process that we are doing with the customers to be able to see which is what finally giving... will give us the best ecosystems, you know, sweet spot of ecosystem, and also the network effect. I mean, that's where I will leave, rely on us to be able to scale this business, to a level, and then you start, seeing the results coming through. That's where I will leave. Back to you, Caroline. Yes. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip. I think let me take additional questions here from Tracy, because there is a question here which keeps coming up, and I think it's an important one to still clarify in terms of how we source for dollars. So please share details on sourcing for dollars in Ethiopia. Do you have priority in accessing dollars from the central bank? And what proportion of dollars requirements do you source from NB versus own sources? Dilip. Yeah. So I think I did answer that, maybe, through another question. We are sourcing our all hard currency dollar requirement, so far, either through the equity the shareholders have put in, the latest being Ethiopia coming in as an equity shareholder. And second, the IFC... Sorry, IFC coming in as an equity shareholder, and then IFC also bringing in $100 billion dollar debt. So, so far, the foreign currency requirement has been met by only external sources, either through equity or through the debt. Now, if to your question, whether are we sourcing dollar from NB? No, we did not, and we didn't, because we are not generating surplus yet to be able to. So we are basically paying, whatever revenue we're generating, we're able to pay to the local suppliers, from the cash flow that's coming through the revenue that we are generating. And from a priority, I think I made that point. We are still not in the priority list, which is what we are aiming for, which is what our effort would be towards, to make sure the telecom being the essential service is made as a priority sector to have priority access to the dollar, when you need to access. But that's not immediate. That's going to take more time, and we do have the foreign currency cover what you need for making payments at this point in time. NBE, National Bank of Ethiopia, is not the source yet. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip. I see we have gotten to the 5:00 P.M. mark, but I'll take one last question, and for the rest of the questions pending, we'll revert back to you directly from the investor relations desk. But let's take a question from Baiju. Baiju is asking: Would it be possible to provide an outlook on future infrastructure projects, that is, fixed data and fiber rollout, and secondly, on data centers? An outlook on future infrastructure projects, Dilip. Maybe, Baiju, what I suggest that we leave it for the Investors' Day, because there are quite a few interesting stuff that's coming up. Fixed is definitely an opportunity, given the very low penetration, but, you know, that also requires your investment priority. How you want to prioritize your investment. We'll be very opportunistic when it comes to fixed line, to make sure, you know, whether we have our sites and with those sites are also fiberized. So, you know, in those areas where we have fiber, I think it's much easier for us to do a fiber and the fixed operations, which is what the team would be very opportunistic and would be focusing on. That's part of the plan. I think data center and data center as currently is basically the captive requirement, but whether we'll do something around in future, it's not necessarily some... You know, it's you know, you don't get into that level of what you call ambition in terms of your capital allocation, where you need to really build your GSM infrastructure to scale your M-PESA business, right? So I think data center would still remain as a key components of captive requirement. Should we have surplus, and then we can serve other customers, and we'll definitely explore that point in time. But infrastructure continues to be a big opportunity in Ethiopia, given where they are, but we need to be very selective about where we want to participate, given our investment levels and the returns as well. Right now, I think, the more I see probably fixed, very opportunistic, fixed opportunity is something that will come in much faster than the other opportunities. Thank you. Thank you, Dilip. Thank you, analyst and investors. So I think we're bringing this to a close, and as I mentioned earlier, we shall get back to you on the remaining questions that have not been answered on the call, so we shall be able to get that answered for you. In the meantime, Dilip, anything else before we close? No. So, thank you. I don't know, Caroline, you want to talk anything about the 2022 and 2023? If not, then just to say that thank you for joining this call. And hope you got updated in terms of the commercial execution that we are doing. And as you said, we keep providing this update every three months, and we'll we'll keep doing it in future. As Peter mentioned, there are short-term challenges, but Ethiopia still continues to be a long-term opportunity for us, and that we are very committed, you know, you know, along with all other constituent members, to make this a successful venture. So with that, I want to conclude and back to you, Caroline, for closing. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Dilip. Thank you, everyone. I think the only thing I will add is, yes, as Peter, Dilip, and Wim said, we are excited and looking forward to hosting you in Ethiopia, so please, ensure that you do not miss being a part of this particular Investor Day. And therefore, especially the foreigners, if you're in a country that requires visas, we are happy to facilitate you as the investor relations team. So reach out to us, and we'll be able to facilitate you. You still do have time, and you can still make it. Otherwise, have yourselves a good evening, a good day, and thank you for joining the call. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks, everyone.