Despite increasing price pressure from competition and adverse regulatory effects, Danish telecoms operator TDC has announced its revenue for the nine months ended 30 September 2010 increased 0.2% year-on-year to DKK19.6 billion (USD3.69 billion). The company’s earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) for the nine-month period totalled DKK8.04 billion, a rise of 2.4% compared to the DKK7.84 billion posted a year earlier, although operating profit excluding special items dropped 10.2% year-on-year to DKK4 billion. The results have been adjusted for the divestment of Swiss unit Sunrise, which was sold to CVC Capital Partners for CHF3.3 billion (USD3.27 billion) in September 2010. The sale was the final element in TDC’s streamlining process, designed to focus on its Nordic operations. ’We have once again proved our ability to effectively defend and in some cases extend our strong market positions in the domestic market, mainly in growth markets such as mobile data and TV, where we have invested and launched a range of innovative products,’ noted Henrik Poulsen, TDC’s president and CEO, adding: ’I am very pleased that we have delivered such solid results in a demanding market with fierce competition.’
At 30 September 2010 TDC reported a total of 8.802 million revenue generating units (RGUs), up 0.8% compared to 8.733 million a year earlier. Domestic RGUs comprised 8.578 million of the total, including 1.46 million PSTN/ISDN customers (down 14.7% year-on-year), 413,000 VoIP users (up 27.1%), 2.82 million mobile telephony customers (a fall of 2.1% versus 3Q09) and 1.299 million retail broadband subscribers (an increase of 0.4% year-on-year). Meanwhile, TDC’s IPTV customers jumped 50% from 77,000 at 30 September 2009 to 116,000 a year later.