Business | Telecoms
du out of the red in UAE market
For the first time since it entered the UAE market 19 months ago, Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company, du, on Sunday said it made a profit of Dh31 million in the last three months.
- By Nadia Saleem, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:26 November 2, 2008
Dubai: For the first time since it entered the UAE market 19 months ago, Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company, du, on Sunday said it made a profit of Dh31 million in the last three months.
The telecom operator reached profitability a year ahead of the financial plans that were announced when it started trading in February 2007.
Osman Sultan, chief executive of du, told Gulf News: "The subscriber number growth is at the high-end of our expectations. Combined with better operational efficiency ... controlling costs is driving this profit earlier than expected.
The total revenue for the third quarter ending Sep-tember 2008, surpassed Dh1 billion for the first time, an increase of 157 per cent since the same period last year.
'Unprecedented'
The earnings before interest, tax, depreciations and amortisation (EBITDA) were Dh101 million.
Sultan said in a statement: "Having a positive EBITDA within a year is unprecedented, specifically in such a highly penetrated telecommunications market."
The company had a net loss of Dh242 in the third quarter last year and had registered a loss of Dh44 million in the second quarter this year, before finally attaining a Dh31 million profit at the end of the third quarter in 2008.
Capital expenditure continued in the third quarter, with a total of Dh347 million being invested to develop fixed and mobile networks in the UAE.
"We have been investing heavily in our infrastructure. We foresee that in the next year, we will be spending as much as we did this year and more," Sultan said, while adding, "We are clearly a growth story still and we intend to continue this growth."
A strong growth in subscribers was seen in the third quarter. An additional of 453,000 subscribers contributed to the total reaching 2.6 million.
The company said the number of active subscribers exceeded expectations, reaching 2 million, up form 659,000 in the same period last year.
The fixed line subscribers reached 248,000, witnessing an increase of 30,000 in the quarter.
Speaking of market share, Sultan said: "Our market share is estimated to be close to 30 per cent, based on the numbers of active subscribers. We are now in this ballpark, while originally our intention was to reach here by the end of this year."
The company's revenue from mobile connections were reported to be Dh819 million, while fixed line revenue accounted for another Dh212 million in the last quarter.
More from Telecoms
More from Business
Business Editor's choice
-
‘Wrong Way' Krugman
The source of our economic malfunction lies with government-mandated bank regulations
-
Greek exit could make Eurozone stronger
Departure will show limits of bailouts and allow remaining members to act much more like a unit
-
UAE upholds values of free trade
Recently released statistics confirm an established fact, namely that of the UAE embracing the free trade principle in general and imports in particular
