Emirates Telecommunications Corporation (Etisalat) has announced its consolidated financial results for the three months ended 30 September 2012, reporting revenue of AED8.008 billion (USD2.2 billion), down 0.4% year-on-year and 3% lower than the previous quarter. At AED5.465 billion, turnover from the firm’s domestic business was 4% lower than Q3 2011 and 3% lower than the second quarter of 2012, mainly due to lower fixed and mobile voice revenues. International revenues meanwhile grew 7% year-on-year to AED2.4 billion, accounting for 30% of total sales, compared to 28% in the year-ago quarter. The majority of sales (AED1.301 billion, an increase of 9% year-on-year) were generated by Egyptian unit Etisalat Misr, followed by the group’s Africa segment (AED689 million, up 2%) and Asia (AED408 million, 10%). Consolidated earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) in the three months ended 30 September 2012 rose 9% year-on-year to AED4.221 billion, while net profit after federal royalty jumped 28% from AED1.723 billion in 3Q11 to AED2.213 billion, which included AED430 million from the sale of a 9.1% stake in Indonesia’s PT XL Axiata, reducing Etisalat’s holding to 4.2%. Etisalat, which is 60% owned by the UAE government, said capital expenditure reached AED912 million in the quarter, of which AED305 million was spent in the UAE.
At the end of September 2012 Etisalat reported a total of nine million subscribers in its home market, including 7.05 million mobile customers. Fixed line customers fell 7% year-on-year to 1.11 million, mainly due to the migration of customers to its ‘eLife’-branded dual and triple-play packages, subscriptions to which grew by 61% to 480,000. Internet customers meanwhile increased 9% to around 800,000. In Africa, Etisalat’s total subscriber base stood at eleven million (an increase of 29% year-on-year), while the company’s Asian customers totalled 8.2 million, down 3% from Q3 2011, following the deconsolidation of its Indian unit, Etisalat DB, in March 2012.