Swedish telecoms group Tele2 – which divested its Russian division in early April – has posted its results for the second quarter of 2013, in which it achieved net intake of 330,000 new customers (lower than the 818,000 recorded in Q2 2012), with net new mobile user additions of 455,000 (compared to 966,000 in 2Q12) outweighing the decline in fixed network subscribers to take its total consolidated group customer total to 15.143 million. Group net revenues amounted to SEK7.476 billion (USD1.135 billion) in the three months ended 30 June 2013, down by 4.0% from SEK7.787 billion in 2Q12. Of the total, mobile services represented SEK5.378 billion, up 2% year-on-year. Group EBITDA was virtually flat in April-June 2013 at SEK1.518 billion (SEK1.519 billion in 2Q12), while mobile EBITDA grew by 12% y-o-y to SEK985 million.
Mobile revenues in Sweden grew by 1% and Swedish mobile EBITDA climbed 19% to SEK757 million, equivalent to just below 50% of group-wide EBITDA in the quarter. Tele2 said 81% of its post-paid Swedish mobile users were on smartphones by the end of June, while 84% of Swedish handsets it sold in the three-month period were 4G LTE models. It added that during the quarter Tele2 Sweden finalised the combined 2G/4G national network rollout via joint infrastructure venture Net4Mobililty with Telenor Sweden, achieving 99% population coverage – which it claimed to be the most extensive 4G network in the country, and is based on 2600MHz, 1800MHz, 900MHz and 800MHz wireless spectrum. During Q2 2013 Tele2 Sweden continued the expansion of both LTE-800 and LTE-1800 to further strengthen 4G capacity and coverage, while also doubling its 900MHz LTE bandwidth from 5MHz to 10MHz across the country, resulting in a significant expansion of 4G network capacity. As a result of the Net4Mobility joint venture, Tele2 Sweden said it has also improved its 2G coverage by increasing its amount of base stations by 20%.
Tele2 Kazakhstan added 309,000 new customers in 2Q13 (significantly less than the 759,000 signed up in 2Q12), to reach a total customer base of 3.162 million at 30 June. Kazakh mobile turnover grew by 46% y-o-y to SEK333 million while underlying mobile service revenue grew by 64%. Thanks to improved operational scale and interconnect levels, EBITDA losses diminished to SEK52 million from SEK105 million in the year-ago quarter. Tele2 has reduced its full-year 2013 revenue forecast for Kazakhstan from SEK1.7 billion-SEK1.8 billion to SEK1.45 billion-SEK1.55 billion.