Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (Du), the United Arab Emirates’ second national telecoms operator, has announced it generated revenue of AED2.52 billion (USD685.9 million) in the three months ended 30 September 2012, an increase of 12.9% from AED2.23 billion in the year-ago quarter. Growth was primarily driven by a 13.0% year-on-year rise in mobile revenue to AED1.94 billion, of which mobile data accounted for AED323 million, an increase of 93.0% from AED167 million in Q3 2011. Du said that earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose 26.1% year-on-year to AED957 million in the third quarter of 2012, while net profit before royalty increased 33.8% to AED654 million, compared to AED489 million in Q3 2011, and rose 0.4% quarter-on-quarter. CAPEX totalled AED318 million in the three-month period, with a focus on the mobile and fixed telephony business.
A total of 227,800 mobile customers were added during the third quarter of 2012 (including 26,300 post-paid users), bringing Du’s total wireless subscriber base to 5.96 million at the end of the reporting period, 7.98% of which were contract customers. Fixed line customers meanwhile increased 7.6% year-on-year to 554,900, including around 222,000 telephony customers, 136,000 broadband subscribers and 120,000 TV users. Revenue generated by Du’s fixed business totalled AED408 million in Q3 2011, compared to AED380 million in the year-ago quarter, but down 0.5% from AED410 million in the second quarter of 2012.