Bharti Airtel has started reaping benefits from its Rs 60,000 crore Project Leap investment program considering the growth in its wireless and wireline broadband business.
The telecom network operator added 3.4 million data customers in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016. At present, Bharti Airtel has 58.2 million (+25.5 percent) data customers, representing 23.2 percent of total customers against 46.4 million, forming 20.5 percent of total customers, in Q4 fiscal 2015.
During the quarter, Airtel’s mobile business had capital expenditure of Rs 3,381 crore primarily in enhancing data capabilities.
Airtel made investment in upgradation and expansion of network towers. The number of telecom towers rose to 154,097 from 146,539.
The number of mobile broadband (MBB) base stations increased to 118,197 in Q4 fiscal 2016 from 54,381 MBB base stations in Q4 fiscal 2015 and 99,297 in Q3 fiscal 2016.
Following the massive investment in 3G and 4G networks during fiscal 2016, mobile phone users used 146.8 billion MB (+69.4 percent) on its network. Mobile data usage per customer increased to 859 MBs (+31 percent). Data ARPU increased to Rs 196 (+11.7 percent).
Airtel revenue from mobile services grew 9.2 percent to Rs 14,652.5 crore. Revenue from mobile data accounted for 23.3 percent of the total mobile revenue against 17.6 percent. Mobile data revenue grew 44.5 percent to Rs 3,356.7 crore. On a sequential quarter basis, data revenue was marginally lower on account of drop in operator roaming data revenues.
Airtel’s Telemedia business recorded DSL additions of 309,000 — driven by launch of pricing plans and an aggressive Go to Market strategy. DSL customers now represent 49.6 percent of the total Telemedia customers as compared to 44.2 percent in the previous year.
The ARPU of Telemedia costumers increased to Rs 1,063 from Rs 1,026 in the previous year, due to increase in data consumption. Telemedia has operations in 87 cities with 3.7 million customers, out of which approximately 1.8 million were broadband DSL customers, representing 49.6 percent of the total Telemedia customers. Revenues from Telemedia operations were Rs 1,246 crore (+10.4 percent).
Airtel had a consolidated debt of $12,661 million as compared to $10,679 million last year, primarily on account of deferred payment liabilities to the DoT.
Baburajan K
editor@telecomlead.com
