Bharti Airtel on Tuesday said that its net profit for the quarter ended December 31, 2017 dropped 55%, at Rs 503.7 crore as against Rs 1,108 crore in the same period of last year.

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The telecom operator further said that its consolidated revenues for the given quarter stood at Rs 23,336 crore, lower by 3% as against the same period of last year and 5.3% sequentially. Bharti Airtel said that its consolidated EBITDA, pure earnings, stood at Rs 8,570 crore, up 1.1% year on year while Consolidated EBITDA margin came in at 36.7%, up 1.5% as against the same period of last year led by Africa margin expansion of 4.9%.

The company said that price war with Reliance Jio has hurt business. It said, "India revenues for Q3’17 at Rs 18,013 crore grew by 1.8% Y-o-Y. Slowdown in Mobile revenue growth primarily due to free voice and data offering by a new operator."

Gopal Vittal, MD and CEO, India & South Asia, said: “The quarter has seen turbulence due to the continued predatory pricing by a new operator."

He said, "The present termination costs at 14 paise which are well below cost has resulted in a tsunami of minutes terminating into our network. This has led to an unprecedented year on year revenue decline for the industry, pressure on margins and a serious impact on the financial health of the sector."

"Consequent to the spectrum acquired worth Rs 14,281 crore during Oct’16 auction, the company’s consolidated net debt has increased to $ 14.339 billion from $ 12.232 billion in the previous quarter," Airtel said. 

Vittal said, "Our commitment to provide a superior experience to our customers has led to revenue market share crossing a lifetime high of 33%. Airtel revenues grew by 1.8% Y-o-Y and our non-mobile businesses continue to grow at a healthy clip and now contribute a sizable 24% of our total revenues."