Telecom operator BT announced its Capex, revenue, 5G progress and Opex for the July-September quarter of 2022.
BT in its earnings report said its capital expenditure (Capex) rose 2 percent to £2.6 billion in the July-September 2022 due to increased Openreach investments in fixed network infrastructure offsetting a decline in spectrum; capital expenditure excluding spectrum payments rose 26 percent.
BT achieved record FTTP build and passed 805,000 premises in the quarter at an average build rate of 62,000 per week and over a third of the way was through the Openreach FTTP build of 25 million. FTTP footprint grew over 50 percent, passing 8.8 million homes and businesses including 2.8 million premises in rural locations.
BT achieved record Openreach FTTP take up with base of 2.4 million, 25,000 weekly net adds and take up rate of 27 percent. BT said over 62 percent of FTTP orders in Q2 were for ultrafast speeds. 54 percent of all FTTP orders in Q2 were from communication providers external to BT Group.
Consumer FTTP connections reached 1.4 million, up 50 percent. Enterprise connections up over 60 percent.
BT’s 5G coverage reached 14 new towns and cities during the quarter. BT’s 5G ready base reached 8.2 million, with Consumer 5G connections more than doubling year on year. Enterprise 5G connections increased 90 percent year on year.
BT reported 1 percent increase in revenue to £10.4 billion, due to growth in Consumer and Openreach partially offset by legacy declines in large corporate customers in Enterprise, lower equipment sales in Global and the impact of the BT Sport disposal.
Openreach broadband base fell 89,000 in Q2 against net adds of 29,000 due to reduced broadband market growth. Openreach lost 40,000 broadband customers due to competitor churn. Its monthly rental ARPU grew by £1 due to increase in fibre-enabled broadband. Openreach is reviewing wholesale pricing to accelerate migration to FTTP.
