Multi-national British telecommunications company Vodafone Group on Tuesday posted a mixed bag of results for the six months ended September 30, 2015.
Though overall revenue for the first half fell 2.3 percent to 20.3 billion British pounds ($30.6 billion), organic group revenue was up one percent to 18.4 billion pounds ($27.8 billion). EBITDA of 5.8 billion pounds ($8.7 billion) was also up 1.9 percent organically but down 1.7 percent as reported, according to the report.
The report showed that some of the company’s struggles came from continued service revenue drops in Europe, which recorded a dip of 6.2 percent in reported terms and a 1.3 percent dip organically to 12.1 billion pounds ($18.2 billion). However, the company was buoyed by service revenue growth of 1.8 percent in reported terms and 6.4 percent organic growth in its Africa, Middle East and Asia Pacific segment.
Despite the mixed results, Vodafone Group chief executive Vittorio Colao said the company had reached an “important turning point” with its “return to organic growth in service revenue and EBITDA,” and said the company remained in a position of leadership among European 4G providers. According to the report, the company boasts nearly 30 million 4G customers across its 19-country footprint and a total of 454.2 million subscribers.
“Our customers are benefiting from the significant investments we are making in high speed mobile and fixed networks, as evidenced by the huge growth in demand for data and the increased loyalty to Vodafone services,” Colao said. “We are achieving 4G leadership in Europe, organic revenue growth in fixed and enterprise and sustained commercial momentum in emerging markets, all of which is consistent with our long-term strategy and which is being accelerated through our Project Spring investments. We also remain keenly focused on increasing efficiency and improving margins. We expect progress to continue in the second half of the year.”
Vodafone said in the report it will look to capitalize on expanding 4G coverage to the 80 percent of its European customer base that is currently not on its 4G service. Vodafone called the prospect a “very substantial opportunity for future growth” since it said those with 4G services “typically buy bigger data packages and see their data consumption double.” The company also said it will launch 4G services in India – which currently has 23.8 million 3G customers – in the coming months.
According to the report, Vodafone’s data traffic grew 75 percent in the first half overall, and average usage per smartphone customer in Europe alone was up 39 percent year over year.
As of April 1, 2016, Vodafone said it will change its reporting currency from the pound sterling to the euro.
