Mdundo Records 31 Million Active Users in Q1 of 2022

Mdundo Records 31 Million Active Users in Q1 of 2022

Mdundo an Africa-focused music streaming service, recorded 31 million active users across the continent in quarter one (Q1) this year, a sharp 49% increase from the previous quarter.

This is according to the company’s latest audience report for the period 1 January to 31 March.

Nigeria and South Africa registered the biggest quarterly growth with 8.3 million and 2.2 million users, which represents a 92% and 80% spike in each market respectively.

Kenya’s user base grew by 46% to 5.7 million users, while the Tanzanian market grew by 10% to 3.9 million. Several other markets grew significantly, including Burundi, DRC, Cameroon, Ivory Coast and South Sudan.

Mdundo says the growth is primarily driven by a growing demand for easy access to music among younger people, and strategic partnerships with leading telcos across the continent. Mdundo’s strategy includes offering users free downloadable music and DJ mixes.

The company continued to grow its advertising partnership footprint in Q1 by partnering with brands such as Airtel, Standard Chartered Bank, East Africa Breweries, Nation Media Group, Zenith Bank and 10Bet Africa, among others.

“Our continued strategic partnerships with leading telcos in Africa, such as MTN, Vodacom and Airtel, continue to offer us a unique platform to reach our target audience through our tailor-made solutions,” Mdundo head of brand partnerships Rachel Karanu said.

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“Looking forward to the next quarter, we remain on course to reaching our targets for the financial year ending June 2022. We will seek to sustain our growth through innovation around acquiring new users, as well as offering an effective platform for our advertising partners.”

Mdundo said earlier this year that it hoped to reach 18 million monthly active users by the end of June 2022. At the end of last year, Mdundo’s music service had 1.7 million international songs and about 365 000 songs directly uploaded to the platform by some 120 000 African musicians.

More Telco Partnerships

Mdundo is now banking on more partnerships with telcos across the continent to grow its earnings and user base.

Last year, the company signed deals with MTN and Airtel in Nigeria, and Vodacom in Tanzania, which appear to be paying off after its user-base almost doubled as it added paying subscribers as a source of revenue.

According to Techcrunch, MTN and Airtel Nigeria have a combined customer-base of 124.5 million, while Vodacom Tanzania has 15.6 million subscribers, giving Mdundo access to a huge target audience.

Mdundo users access music through USSD services on a bundled program (daily, weekly or monthly). The streaming service is also accessible through its website or app, which has more than 1 million downloads.

By December 2021, Mdundo had 1.7 million international songs on its platform and 367,000 tracks uploaded by 122,000 African musicians, a 46 percentage point growth from December 2020. The company pays more than 50% of its income to music creators.

The Kenya-based business was founded in 2013 and listed in the Nasdaq First North Growth Market — a Nasdaq Nordic division — in September 2020 to fast-track its growth across Africa. It has grown from a user base of less than one million in 2016 to 13.8 million by the close of 2021.

Across Africa there are more than 20 music streaming services, including Sweden’s Spotify, which is in 44 African countries after expanding to an additional 38 countries in the continent last year. Nigeria-headquartered Boomplay and Songa by Kenya’s telco Safaricom are other popular streaming products.