Digi
KUALA LUMPUR: Digi.Com Bhd posted earnings of RM358.88mil on the back of RM1.55bil in revenue in the second quarter ended June 30, 2017, driven by the firm post-paid and internet revenue growth.
It said on Wednesday the earnings were down 14.6% from RM420.61mil a year ago while revenue dipped by 6.2% from RM1.552bil. Earnings per share were 4.62 sen.
Digi declared an interim dividend of 4.6 sen or RM358mil payable to shareholders on Sept 29.
The telco said it delivered better earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (Eebitda) margin, revealing that the company is making headway in its plans to capitalise on the growing demand for data among Malaysians despite continued competition within the telco sector.
Internet revenue grew 13.3% from last year and 2.6% on-quarter from a larger active internet subscriber base of 69.1% and 68.6% smartphone adoption.
Its postpaid revenue rose 8.9% on-year and 3.1% on-quarter to RM536mil, on the back of robust postpaid internet revenue contribution of RM302mil..
However, its prepaid revenue moderated to RM917mil but the on-quarter decline narrowed to 3.7% backed by a broader 9.7 million subscriber base and 3.7% on-year growth in prepaid internet revenue.
Ernings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) strengthened on-quarter by 0.8% to RM717mil with a 1.0 percentage point increase in Ebitda margin at 46%
Digi's postpaid subscriber growth rose 103,000 to 2.3 million, which was a 4.7% increase sequentially while its prepaid subscriber base increased 151,000 to 9.7 million. This saw its overall subscriber base rising to 12.0 million.
Its 4G+ services accounted for 5.3 million 4G LTE subscribers on its network, which also resulted in them using 1.4 times more data than last year. Quality of its nationwide 4G+ network was further boosted by the recent launch of its LTE 900Mhz sites on July 1, 2017.
Digi’s CEO Albern Murty said while this continued to be a challenging quarter for the industry, “we have delivered resilient performance to sustain healthy margins and returns”.
He said earnings were driven by the strong uptake momentum of its internet and digital services offerings in both our postpaid, prepaid, enterprise businesses, and most recently, the internet of things (IoT) business.
For the first half, its earnings were down 10.6% to RM732mil from RM819.65mil in the previous corresponding period. Revenue fell 5.5% to RM3.126bil from RM3.308bil.
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