Celcom Axiata has 13.2 million mobile subscribers as of Quarter 3, 2014 (Q3) down 1% from 13.4 million subscribers in Q2. The total smartphone users in the network makes up 40.7% of Celcom’s total subscribers or 5.41 million users.
There are 10.4 million prepaid users and about 2.8 million postpaid users in the network. Broadband users increased to 1.4 million subscribers. Postpaid ARPU is at RM84 while prepaid ARPU is at RM33. Despite registering growth in Broadband subscribers, the Broadband ARPU is down to RM49 in Q3 from RM51 in Q2.
The Telco has recently completed its two-year IT transformation exercise, a process that limited its ability to launch new product & services in the market. The Celcom IT transformation facilitates seamless integration across multiple channels to enhance customer experience. Following the completion of the exercise, Celcom saw overall improvements in the stability of the platforms and environment which led to greater confidence in the telco’s operating systems, enabling Celcom to roll-out new products and services faster and more aggressively to the market, it said.
For the quarter under review (third quarter financial results), Celcom reported a revenue of RM1.93 billion while service revenue reached RM1.78 billion.
Celcom’s quarterly EBITDA (Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization) showed a marginal decrease to RM807 million with an EBITDA margin of 42%.
Meanwhile, Celcom’s quarterly PATAMI (profit after tax, amortisation and minority interests) stood at RM493 million.
Overall data revenue grew 20.4% to RM1.2 billion, contributing 20.9% of Celcom’s year-to-date (YTD) total revenue of RM5.8 billion compared to 16.7% last year. Mobile internet revenue achieved a strong 58.7% (y-o-y) growth to RM585 millio.
Dato’ Sri Shazalli Ramly, Chief Executive Officer of Celcom Axiata Berhad said, “Amidst competitive market challenges, Celcom managed to achieve healthy, consistent and sustainable growth in mobile data. This shows customers’ trust and confidence in our offerings and exemplifies our commitment to continue providing them with superior data services.
“We are confident that our IT transformation exercise will greatly help us to improve efficiencies and maximise growth opportunities. It has been a challenging quarter not only for us but the whole industry. Nevertheless, we will continue to increase productivity across all areas through our strategic initiatives in order to drive positive outcomes and improve our business performance,” Dato’ Sri Shazalli added.
Moving forward, Celcom said it will continue to embark on various initiatives to develop sustainable relationships with its customers and business partners by providing the best offerings and value-added services to them.
