Idea Cellular has released its results for the third quarter ended December 31, 2012.
The operator has posted a 5 per cent increase in sequential quarterly revenue and its standalone revenue stood at Rs 56.13 billion during the quarter. The company?s standalone revenues registered a 10.8 per cent increase year-on-year, as against Rs 50.65 billion in the third quarter of financial year 2012.
The company has attributed the growth in quarterly revenue to the 5.2 per cent increase in voice minutes to 132.2 billion minutes, compared to 125.6 billion minutes in the second quarter of financial year 2013.
Idea Cellular also registered 2.9 million additions in the number of visitor location register subscribers in the quarter under consideration, compared to 0.6 million additions in the second quarter of financial year 2013.
Its average realised rate per minute (ARPM) declined in this quarter, owing to the 14.6 per cent decline in the contribution of non-voice services to overall revenues. The standalone EBITDA was Rs 13.17 billion, compared to Rs 12.61 billion in the previous quarter. The EBITDA margin has declined by 23.5 per cent, on account of higher inflationary burden in network operating expenses.
Adverse currency movement has resulted in a Rs 133 million loss in foreign exchange during the quarter, against a Rs 180 million gain in foreign exchange in the second quarter.
The company maintained the trend of free cash flow (after capital expenditure, but excluding spectrum payout). However, profit after tax stood at Rs. 1.91 billion and cash profit was Rs 11.08 billion, both lower compared to the previous quarter, primarily due to the dividend payment received from Indus Towers in the second quarter of financial year 2013.
Of its 114 million subscribers, the number of customers adopting data services has grown to 21.75 million, currently contributing 5.7 per cent to service revenues. The volume of data used increased by 14.8 per cent to 9,575 TB in the period under consideration, while data revenue on a sequential quarter basis grew by 10.8 per cent. The active 3G subscriber base for the company now stands at 4.1 million.
