Major South African company pushing hard into Europe and Asia

Cartrack-owner Karooooo plans to push further into Europe and Asia, as the group sees a significant increase in earnings.

“FY 2025 was a year of strong execution, impactful innovation and significant progress,” said Zak Calisto, Group CEO of Karooooo.

“We accelerated customer acquisition, enhanced our platform with more advanced AI Video capabilities and other features, and successfully launched the Cartrack-Tag.”

Calisto added that the company remains optimistic about continued healthy organic growth in South Africa, while its investments in Europe should accelerate subscriber growth.

Cartrack subscribers in Europe increased 20% to just over 200,000, with subscription revenue growth of 15%.

The group plans to accelerate organic growth, expand its customer base and increase subscription sales to existing regional customers.

The group is partnering with OEMs to provide easy access to its platform, which it believes will seamlessly integrate vehicle data into its platform through application programming interfaces.

Calisto also noted that Southeast Asia continues to represent Cartrack’s medium-to-long-term growth opportunity, and the group is excited about progress in the region.

Cartrack subscribers in the Asia Pacific and Middle East region increased 19% to 273,946, with subscription revenue growth of 21%.

In September 2024, the group started a drive to increase Sales and Marketing in Southeast Asia and believes this will begin to see results in FY 2026. It aims to increase its sales headcount by 70%

Overall, the Singapore-based, South African-founded, and NASDAQ-listed company saw Cartrack’s subscribers increase 17% to over 2.3 million, with net Cartrack subscriber additions of 330,704.

Karooooo’s overall subscription revenue increased 15% to R4 billion, with Cartrack accounting for all but R13 million of it. Karooooo Logistics’s DaaS revenue jumped 33% to R420 million.

Karooooo’s operating profit increased 26% to R1.3 billion, while its earnings per share also increased by 25% to R29.81 per share.

Problems closer to home

Despite the group’s overall strong results, Mozambique remains an area of concern.

Subscription revenue in Africa was tempered by a temporary suspension of subscription billing to its existing customers in Mozambique following political riots and mass demonstrations.

The country’s operating environment continues to be impacted by ongoing political and economic instability, which has led to uncertainty regarding the country’s near—to medium—term outlook.

This uncertainty made the operating environment challenging, leading to a goodwill impairment of R43.6 million during the final quarter of the 2024 financial year.