MTN Group on Wednesday disclosed that its instant messaging platform, Ayoba, has reached 5.5 million monthly active users as of December 2020.
To ensure Africa doesn’t miss out on the instant messaging revolution, MTN launched its instant messaging platform, Ayoba, in March 2019.
Ayoba is an advanced communications application localised for African and Middle East consumer needs, under an independent Over the Top (OTT) brand with unique features for MTN customers.
“We expanded our instant messaging platform Ayoba making good strides in the year, to record 5,5 million monthly active users, an addition of 3,5 million,” the company disclosed in annual results.
The mobile phone company said Ayoba has now been integrated into 16 MTN markets and can be downloaded across many other markets on the Google Play Store, Apple App Store, and via the Ayoba website as an OTT offering.
Furthermore, MTN said its streaming service MusicTime! is now live in nine MTN markets, and 15 opcos live with MusicTime in the ayoba app.
MTN Nigeria subscriptions for instant messaging platform rose by 120,9% to 1,4 million users.
The Ayoba app supports many local languages spoken across the MTN markets, including isiZulu, isiXhosa, Pidgin, Yoruba, Swahili, Hausa, French and English.
MTN, together with its partners, is driven to improve access to affordable communications to ensure that people in its markets can reap the social, economic and developmental dividends of being online. Ayoba underscores this goal to bring more people into the digital world by providing affordable and simplified digital communication services.
Last month, MTN assured Ayoba users that it is focused on protecting users’ privacy and security. It added that it is not possible for messages in the app to be read by anyone else or to be shared with any third parties, including MTN.
The app features peer-to-peer private messaging, which is end-to-end encrypted. Ayoba treats data with the utmost care and respect in line with its privacy policy said MTN.
Ayoba users can send and receive encrypted messages, share photos, videos, files, voice notes and even their location, and can also subscribe to live channels. Localised content is available through these channels that aim to entertain, educate and empower communities.
