LONDON-The world’s largest mobile operator said it grew its proportional customer base to 146.7 million at the end of September and will double its dividend for the six months to about 4 cents. Vodafone Group plc reported a pretax profit of $10.6 billion, although it still reported a net loss of $5.9 billion, less than the $7.9 billion loss in the same period last year.
The U.K.-based carrier’s group revenue for the six-month period ending Sept. 30 declined slightly to $31.1 billion compared with last year.
Vodafone played up its 11-percent customer growth. “A key driver has been the continued strong growth in customers across many of our controlled business, principally the U.K., Spain and Germany, as well as in Verizon Wireless, our associate business in the U.S., offset by weaker performance in Japan,” said Arun Sarin, Vodafone chief executive.
Last week, the carrier launched its commercial third-generation services in 13 markets. At the end of September, Vodafone said it had 11.5 million Vodafone Live! multimedia service customers and 323,000 customers for its laptop datacard 3G service. Non-voice services hit 16.4 percent of total service revenue during the period, Vodafone said.
For the full-year, Vodafone said it expects 10 percent growth in average proportionate mobile customers. It expects its free cash flow to be about $13 billion, lower than in the 2004 financial year due to non-recurring receipts from hedging instruments and higher fixed-asset expenditures. Vodafone said it expects to double its year-end dividend as well.
“Without going into great detail most of the core indicators are up, and those that are down are down by about what we would expect and are not causes for concern,” said Robin Hearn, senior analyst with U.K.-based analyst firm Ovum. “For example, ARPU continues to be pressurized in Germany, but EBITDA margins are up year-on-year to nearly 47 percent, and the Japan position is broadly where it is expected to be. The time to pick over this market will be in six to 12 months when the results of the “transformation” plan become for more measurable.”
