Nawras Q1 revenue down 2.7%

Oman’s second national telecoms operator Nawras has announced its unaudited financial results for the three months ended 31 March 2012, posting a 2.7% year-on-year decline in revenue to OMR46.8 million (USD121.2 million) from OMR48.1 million in Q1 2011. The company said that sales were hit by a reduction in SMS revenues which was not fully offset by growth in data revenue. In addition, revenue in the first quarter of 2012 included a one-off accounting adjustment of OMR658,000. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell 5.6% from OMR25.6 million in the first three months of 2011 to OMR24.2 million a year later, while net profit totalled OMR9.8 million in Q1 2012, down 19.1% from OMR12.1 million in the year-ago quarter. Nawras, which is 55%-owned by Qatar Telecom (Qtel), reported 1.988 million mobile and fixed customers at the end of March 2012, an increase of 2.4% year-on-year. Wireless customers accounted for the majority of that total (1.956 million), and included 1.783 million pre- and 171,980 million post-paid subscribers (up 1.1% and 2.0% y-o-y, respectively), while fixed line subscribers grew by over 270% over the period to 32,857.