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Johannesburg - Telecoms network Telkom has reported a mixed bag of results regarding its subscriber base, with ADSL and mobile user numbers growing but its fixed-line figures falling.
According to Telkom’s annual results for the period ending March 2015, the company reported that its ADSL subscriber numbers grew 7.9% from 931 858 subscribers last year to 1 005 286 this year.
As a result, Telkom said its fixed-line data revenue increased 1.5% to R10.4bn.
But Telkom’s total number of fixed access lines, which includes voice users, fell 4.9% during the period from 3.618 million to 3.439 million.
Revenue associated with Telkom’s fixed-line voice business was also on a significant downward curve for the period.
“Fixed-line voice usage revenue continued its downward trend, decreasing 13.5% to R6.867bn (March 2014: R7.934bn),” said Telkom in its results announcement.
“This can be attributed to a 9.6% decline in voice minutes, resulting from fixed-to-mobile substitution and a 4.9% decline in the number of lines. The decrease was in business as well as residential lines. Business lines decreased due to the consolidation of business activities and cost-saving initiatives,” said Telkom.
The company said however that its fixed-line subscriptions revenue grew 2.5% to R8bn - up from R7.812bn in March 2014. This is as a result of average line rental tariff increases of about 6%, said Telkom.
Mobile subscriber numbers
Meanwhile, Telkom’s number of active mobile subscribers increased 21.2% to 2 186 774 with a blended average revenue per user (ARPU) of R75.05 for the period ending March 2015.
Telkom also said that its number of integrated mobile sites or towers in South Africa increased 3.4% to 2 510. In addition, Telkom’s number of integrated LTE sites also rose 11.3% to 1 317, according to the company.
In terms of its mobile business, Telkom said it recorded a strong performance with this unit’s earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) loss having improved by 48.7%.
The company also said that its mobile net revenue increased 174.1% to R954m and that its mobile data revenue rose 50.6% during the period to R988m.
Telkom added that its mobile voice and subscriber revenue lifted 46% from R491m in March 2014 to R717m for the period ending March 2015.
“This can be attributed to a 21.2% increase in the number of active mobile subscribers and a 19.5% increase in blended ARPU,” said Telkom.
Payments to mobile operators also decreased 37.2% for Telkom as a result of a reduction in mobile termination rates.
The telecom company’s mobile capital expenditure further fell 64.8% from R1.368bn last year to R481m for the period ending March 2015.
The company attributed this decrease to the “shift to a more concentrated roll-out in major metropolitan areas”.
“The current focus on the radio access network (RAN) is to complete existing projects and to provide capacity to relieve congestion in identified growth areas,” said Telkom.
Overall, Telkom’s annual results revealed that its group net revenue increased 3.1% to R26bn while its Ebitda rose 15.1% to R9bn. The group did, however, report a profit after tax of R2.9bn which is 19.5% lower than the R3.6bn recorded in March 2014.
