British alternative broadband provider TalkTalk has published its financial results for the six months to 30 September 2015 (H1 2016), reporting a ‘strong acceleration’ in growth, with turnover for the period rising by 4.7% year-on-year.
In the six-month period under review TalkTalk generated total revenues of GBP912 million (USD1.41 billion), up from GBP871 million in the first half of its previous fiscal year, while it highlighted revenue growth of 5.9% in the second quarter. On-net revenues, meanwhile, were up 7.6% against H1 2015, with corporate turnover also climbing notably, up 6.2% year-on-year in H1 2016. Headline EBITDA (excluding exceptional items and amortisation of acquisition intangibles) was GBP90 million, down from GBP110 million a year earlier, having been impacted by the company’s significant planned investment in transformation programme ‘Making TalkTalk Simple’ (‘MTTS’). Profit after tax also slumped, more than halving to GBP11 million from GBP27 million. With regards to the recent high-profile cyber-attack which affected the company, TalkTalk said that based on the exceptional and one-off costs including the revenue impact from the loss of online sales and service capability associated with the attack, it currently expects a financial impact of between GBP30 million and GBP35 million in FY2016.
In operational terms, TalkTalk confirmed that, having disposed of its off-net broadband subscriber base to Fleur Telecom following a deal announced in March 2015, it is no longer active in the off-net consumer market. The company added 99,000 net new fibre customers during the half, taking the total to 578,000, a figure which represented 16% of its overall broadband base at end-September 2015 (unchanged y-o-y). In addition, TalkTalk said it had made good progress with its trial of fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) in York, with 262 triallists signed up from the 3,328 homes in the first phase of the build. In the mobile sector, meanwhile, the company cited strong growth on the back of the launch of its ‘Unlimited SIM’ plan, with 132,000 net adds in H1 2016, bringing the total to 596,000.
Commenting on the results, TalkTalk chief executive Dido Harding said: ‘We have delivered H1 results in line with our plan and revenue growth accelerated strongly through the second quarter. We have a robust plan to deliver a significant step-up in profits in H2, underpinned by the benefits of our transformation programme coming through strongly.’