2023-07-11 20:32:18
In the first half of the year, the partly state-owned, listed Telekom Austria achieved sales of EUR 2.56 billion, 7.6 percent more than in the same period of the previous year. A comparison of the second quarters this year and last year shows an increase of 7.5 percent to EUR 1.21 billion. The bottom line is that the group earned EUR 301 million in the first half (plus 1.1 percent) and in the second quarter at EUR 167 million, 0.4 percent less than in the previous year, according to a statement.
Operating profits were fully offset by weaker financial results, the company writes. The higher interest rates compared to the second quarter of the previous year led to higher interest expenses. In addition, the financial result was negatively impacted by exchange rate effects.
The company is also active in Belarus. There, too, costs are increasing. In the autocratically governed country, which is closely allied with Russia, prices cannot be adjusted accordingly due to “restrictive price regulations”. The financial result was also negatively affected, above all, by the devaluation of the Belarusian ruble against the euro.
“There was also a solid development in the second quarter,” says CEO Thomas Arnoldner, who will move into the second row in September and then become deputy CEO of the current COO Alejandro Plater. Among other things, he referred to service sales, which increased by 5.5 percent to EUR 1.03 billion in the second quarter. In the first half of the year, they rose by 5.3 percent to EUR 2.12 billion.
“There was strong growth in Bulgaria and Austria, among other places,” says Arnoldner. Despite the general increase in costs and significantly higher energy costs, EBITDA rose by 6.3 percent to EUR 457 million (half-year: plus EUR 3.7 to EUR 922 million). Increased investments flowed primarily into broadband expansion in Austria and the acquisition of spectrum in Croatia (EUR 110 million).
Board member and soon-to-be CEO Plater (COO): “Fiber products as well as the solutions and connectivity business contributed to the growth. In an environment of rising costs, we continued to focus consistently on the implementation of efficiency measures.” With the filling of the board positions of the new radio tower company EuroTeleSites AG and the planned IPO on the Vienna Stock Exchange in autumn, important strategic groundwork has been set. “The existing systems can then be better used and the network expansion will be faster and more efficient,” Plater. The next step for the spin-off of the radio tower business is an extraordinary general meeting on August 1st.
The number of mobile customers rose by 5.2 percent to 24.49 million in the half-year comparison. According to Plater, “driven mainly by the strong growth in the M2M business and the demand for mobile WiFi routers”. The number of RGUs – so-called revenue-generating units – rose by 1.9 percent to 6.25 million over the same period.
Mobile communications revenue from services rose by 7.6 percent to EUR 1.51 billion in a half-year comparison, and revenue from the sale of handsets rose by 15.2 percent to EUR 327 million. In the same period, fixed-network revenues from services rose by 4.8 percent to EUR 934 million, and from terminal device sales by 88.7 percent (correct) to EUR 62 million.
Due to the solid sales development in the first half of 2023, Austria’s largest mobile communications company is raising its sales forecast for the year as a whole. Sales growth of around 5 percent instead of the previous 4 percent is now expected.
As of June 30, the group employed 17,757 people. This corresponded to a slight decline of 0.5 percent.
In a half-year comparison, the net margin fell by 0.8 points to 11.8 percent. In a quarterly comparison, the value fell by one point to 12.8 percent.
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