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NEW DELHI: Telecom major Bharti Airtel on Tuesday reported a consolidated loss of Rs 1,035 crore for December quarter compared with a profit of Rs 86 crore in the same period last year.
Analysts in an ET NOW poll were expecting a loss of Rs 638 crore.
Average revenue per user (Arpu) for mobile services increased to Rs 135 from Rs 128 sequentially.
Total revenue for the quarter rose 8.5 per cent to Rs 21,947 crore from Rs 20,231 crore on a yearly basis.
The company’s Ebitda jumped 48.3 per cent to Rs 9,350 crore from Rs 6,307 crore YoY.
Margins climbed to 42.6 per cent against 31.2 per cent.
India revenue rose 7 per cent, while those at Africa operations jumped by 14.2 per cent.
The company said it has raised Rs 21,502 crore through a combination via qualified institutional placement and convertible bonds.
Airtel intends to use these proceeds to augment long-term resources and strengthen balance sheet.
MD and CEO, India - South Asia, Gopal Vittal said: “While tariff revision undertaken in December is a welcome step towards repairing the financial health of the industry, we believe tariffs must go up further for enabling the industry to invest in emerging technologies.”
Vittal said Airtel was on track to shut down 3G networks across India and refarm the 900 and 2100 band spectrum to further boost its 4G footprint.
Mobile data traffic increased to 5,166 petabyte during the quarter compared with 2,996 petabyte in the corresponding quarter last year.
Mobile 4G data customers increased 60.6 per cent to 12.38 crore from 7.71 crore in the corresponding quarter last year.
“This quarter, we witnessed strong 4G customer additions of 2.1 crore.
Digital TV revenue witnessed a growth of 15.6 per cent on an underlying basis (decline of 23.3 per cent on reported basis due to reporting changes in DTH pursuant to the new tariff order).
Airtel business revenue witnessed a growth of 6.6 per cent on YoY basis,” the company said.
The company’s overall customer base stood at 41.90 crore across 16 countries.
