UK-based cable and mobile group Liberty Global has reported a 0.8% year-on-year decline in revenue for the three months ended 30 June 2015, as foreign exchange movements offset organic growth from cable broadband, mobile telephony and data and business-to-business (B2B) services. Turnover for the quarter was USD4.57 billion, compared to USD4.60 billion twelve months earlier, while operating cash flow (OCF) was up 1.9% y-o-y to USD2.19 billion, due largely to the inclusion of Ziggo, following its acquisition in late 2014.
In terms of subscribers, Liberty Global claimed a total of 27.394 million unique customers, representing 56.336 million revenue generating units (RGUs), compared to 24.471 million and 48.905 million respectively in June 2014. Liberty Global’s European units registered 2.05 RGUs per customer relationship, with 44.5% of customers signed up to triple-play packages (41.6% in June 2014), 16.3% on double-play tariffs (15.7%) and the remaining 39.2% taking a single service (42.7%). RGUs per customer declined slightly across the group’s Latin American operations, however, falling from 2.13 to 2.10, as the proportion of triple-play customers edged down to 44.0% from 46.1% a year earlier, and the number of single-play subscriptions increased to 33.9%. Elsewhere, the group’s mobile subscriber base grew by 95,800 compared to the previous quarter, with Belgium and the Netherlands reporting the strongest growth, adding 29,200 and 20,400 net new users respectively.
Meanwhile, consolidated ARPU per customer relationship was down 9.9% to USD44.91, although the group notes that excluding the impact of foreign exchange movements, ARPU would be up by 4.4%.