TIM Brasil reports a sharp rise in Q4 net profits

Brazil’s third largest mobile operator TIM Participacoes (TIM Brasil), the holding company for TIM Celular and Intelig Telecomunicacoes, has announced its results for the fourth quarter of 2010 and FY2010. In the fourth quarter the company said its subscriber base grew 24.1% year-on-year, with net addition of 9.9 million lines, to reach 51 million – a market share of 25.1%. The cellco’s post-paid customer base reached 7.5 million users by the year end. In 2010 as a whole, TIM added one million net new post-paid clients, reversing a net loss of 117,000 in 2009, thanks to its Infinity and Liberty price plans which ended the quarter with more than three million users. The strong performance was accompanied by top line growth of 9.9% year-on-year in the fourth quarter, EBITDA of BRL1.20 billion (up 11%) and EBITDA margin reaching 30.6%, versus 30.4% in 4Q09. For the full year, net profit totalled BRL2.21 billion, compared with BRL801.2 million in FY2009. TIM Brasil is controlled by Telecom Italia.