10 key takeaways from Airtel’s Q3 result

Bharti Airtel’s net profit fell 55% to Rs 503.7 crore in the third quarter ended December 31 as compared to Rs 1,108.1 crore during the same period last year. 

“The quarter has seen turbulence due to the continued predatory pricing by a new operator. The present termination costs at 14 paise which are well below cost has resulted in a tsunami of minutes terminating into our network. This has led to an unprecedented year on year revenue decline for the industry, pressure on margins and a serious impact on the financial health of the sector,” Gopal Vittal, MD and CEO, India & South Asia, said. 

Here are 10 key takeaways from Bharti Airtel’s Q3 results
 
1. Customer base increased from 363,088 in September 2016 to 364,564 in December last year.

2. The company’s revenues nosedived to Rs 23,335.7 crore in Q3 from Rs 24,651.5 crore in the September quarter. The revenues were Rs 24,065.9 during the same period last year.

3. Earnings before income tax deduction and amortisation (EBITDA) fell even further to Rs 8,570.5 crore as compared to Rs 9,466.2 crore in the September quarter. EBITDA was Rs 8,474.9 crore in December 2015.

4. Mobile data traffic at 216 billion MBs in the quarter had an underlying growth of 36.4% Y-o-Y.

5. Consolidated mobile data revenues at Rs 4,049 crore Y-o-Y, which the company said was flat on an underlying basis.

6. Airtel’s ‘net debt’ skyrocketed to Rs 97,395.2 crore from Rs 78,451.5 crore during the same period last year.

7. The company’s total employees in December 2015 were 24,868, which decreased to 23,289 at the end of last month.

8. Airtel lost out on global customer base as the company said it covered 1.87 billion last month and 2.02 billion in December 2015.

9. Airtel’s capital expenditure also increased possibly due to the Spectrum Auction last year to Rs 5,853.7 crore as compared to Rs 5,508.2 crore in December 20015.

10. Airtel missed out on number of countries operational in as in December’ 15 it was present in 20 nations while in December’ 16 it was 17.