Thursday 28 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR (April 19): Maxis Bhd's net profit for the first quarter ended March 31, 2018 (1QFY18) rose 4.2% to RM523 million, from RM502 million a year earlier, driven by continuous cost optimisation initiatives that offset lower service revenue.

Revenue, however, dropped 5.8% year-on-year (y-o-y) to RM2.2 billion from RM2.4 billion due to increased competition, particularly in the prepaid market.

Maxis declared an interim single-tier tax-free dividend of five sen per share for the financial year ending Dec 31, 2018 to be paid on June 28. The entitlement date for the dividend payment is May 31.

In a statement accompanying its results to Bursa Malaysia, the mobile telecommunication network provider said service revenue was marginally lower at RM1.98 billion, from RM2.1 billion a year ago, due to the decline in prepaid which offset the growth in postpaid.

Service revenue is defined as group revenue excluding device, hubbing and network income, according to Maxis.

It added the postpaid revenue grew 5.2% to RM985 million from RM936 million last year, registering the highest shared line acquisition and increased average revenue per account through mobile and fixed offerings.

"This was supported by the monthly postpaid average revenue per user (ARPU) of RM92 and our flagship MaxisONE Plan (MOP) which continued to attract high-value subscribers.

"MOP registered 283,000 new additions y-o-y, bringing the total base to 2 million customers," it said.

Further, Maxis said the prepaid revenue softened to RM849 million from RM1 billion last year due to lower subscription base.

"This was driven by aggressive price competition, continued SIM consolidation and migration to postpaid.

"We continue to sustain high Mobile Internet (MI) penetration of 73%, which supported our high prepaid ARPU of RM41 per month," Maxis said.

Blended ARPU remained unchanged at RM56 y-o-y. It takes into account users in the postpaid, prepaid and wireless broadband segments.

Maxis said its first-quarter normalised profit after tax was stable at RM510 million, on the back of solid earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA).

"Normalised EBITDA continued to be stable at RM1.020 billion, slightly lower from RM1.024 billion a year ago. EBITDA margin (on service revenue) was high at 51.5% against 49.3% last year," it said.

Its chief executive officer Robert Nason said the group's focus remains on providing attractive products and great connectivity to its customers.

"This will only get better as we progress with our ambition to be fully digital.

"We delivered a steady quarter with solid EBITDA and high EBITDA margin in a highly competitive market," Nason said.

At the midday break today, Maxis rose 5 sen or 0.86% to RM5.87, giving it a market capitalisation of RM45.7 billion.

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