The Philippines’ second largest telecoms group by subscribers, Globe Telecom, a subsidiary of Philippine conglomerate Ayala Corp and Singapore Telecom (SingTel), recorded its highest quarterly revenue performance in the three months ended 31 December 2008, with service revenues of PHP16.3 billion (USD343.3 million), up 5% quarter-on-quarter and surpassing the previous record of PHP16.1 billion – booked in the fourth quarter of 2007. The operator said the strong quarterly performance was driven by strong holiday demand and the positive impact of new mobile and broadband offers it launched in the fourth quarter. Nonetheless, Globe’s full-year net income for 2008 was PHP11.28 billion, down 15% from PHP13.28 billion a year earlier, on twelve-month service revenues of PHP62.89 billion (PHP63.21 billion in 2007) and EBITDA of PHP37.40 billion (PHP40.22 billion).
In the three months to 31 December 2008 Globe Telecom maintained its momentum in terms of wireless subscriber acquisitions by adding one million SIMs, to end the year with a total subscriber base of 24.7 million, up 22% from a year ago. The company said its mass market brand, TM, led the growth, accounting for 70% of the total 4.4 million net additions recorded in 2008, bringing in more than three million new TM users. In addition, Globe said the popularity of its broadband services, and in particular wireless broadband, continued apace. The operator added a net 55,000 users in the fourth quarter – more than the total for the previous three quarters combined – to close out 2008 with a broadband subscriber base of 234,000, almost double the end-2007 figure. The continued expansion of broadband and corporate data services helped offset a slowdown in wireless revenues which declined by 1% to PHP55.6 billion from the previous year’s PHP56.4 billion, while wireline revenues improved by 7% to PHP7.3 billion from PHP6.8 billion in 2007.