Bharti Airtel, reported its June quarter numbers aftermarket hours yesterday, reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 1,462 crore, higher than Reuters estimate of Rs 1,159 crore.
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However, net loss before exceptional item in Africa narrowed to Rs 520.4 crore from Rs 976.3 crore on year-on-year (y-o-y) basis.
In last 2 years, Bharti Airtel has undertaken tower assets sales in 11 countries (with 9 closed and settled and 2 to be closed shortly) and divested 2 country telecom operations (Burkina Faso and Sierra Leone) – for a sum total consideration of Dollars 3.25 billion (Rs 21,947.25 crore), the company said.
Bharti Airtel, India’s largest mobile phone company, reported a quarterly net income that beat analysts’ expectations, helped by rising demand for mobile data services in the world’s fastest-growing telecom market.
Airtel achieved mobile services revenue of Rs 15,052.6 crore (+9.1 percent). The share of data to mobile revenues in India grew to 24% compared to 19% in the same period a year ago.
Airtel’s capital expenditure in the quarter was higher by 23% at Rs 4,925 crore against Rs 3,992 crore in the same period previous year. The company had over 358 million customers across its operations as of June end.
Airtel said it will offer prepaid customers as much as 67 percent more data for the same fees, according to a statement July 17.
Earlier in July Indian conglomerate Reliance Industries said it would launch its much-awaited fourth-generation (4G) wireless services commercially in the coming months, competing with Bharti Airtel, which ramped up coverage of its 4G services previous year to 300 towns in anticipation.
Mobile Broadband customers increased by 68.3 per cent to 36.6 million from 21.7 million in the corresponding quarter a year ago.
The company gained across geographies in data business.
In constant currency (as on March 1, 2016) terms, Airtel Africa revenues adjusted for the impact of divested operating unit and tower assets grew by 2 per cent on y-o-y basis.
Bharti has so far this year spent more than $1 billion to acquire airwaves from smaller rivals to take on Jio’s nationwide network footprint. However, it reduced the headcount in South Asia and Africa by 81 and 803 respectively.
“Net Income for the quarter stands at Rs 1,462 crore compared to Rs 2,113 crore in corresponding quarter past year”.
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As of 09.40 a.m., Bharti Airtel shares traded 0.8 per cent higher at Rs 375.50, outperforming the broader Nifty that was up 0.35 per cent.
