JOHANNESBURG :South Africa’s Telkom reported a 6.5 per cent rise in quarterly core profit on Tuesday, helped by subscriber growth and increased use of its “next-generation network” (NGN) offerings as it ditched legacy services.
Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), came in at 2.8 billion rand ($155.62 million) in the first quarter ended June 30, South Africa’s third-largest telecom company said in a statement.
Overall group revenue rose 1.1 per cent to 10.82 billion rand with mobile service revenue and Openserve’s fibre data revenue up 7.8 per cent and 11.3 per cent, respectively.
Telkom said mobile data subscribers surged 27.5 per cent to 17.2 million, while there was a 17.5 per cent increase in the number of homes connected with fibre.
The majority state-owned company has been investing in migrating customers away from copper-based technology to offerings such as fibre and long-term evolution – a 4G wireless standard – as customers seek faster internet services.
($1 = 17.9928 rand)
