KUALA LUMPUR: Maxis Bhd’s net profit for its third quarter ended Sept 30, 2014 (3QFY14), came in at RM449 million, a marginal 0.67% improvement from its previous quarter’s (2QFY14) RM446 million.

Revenue for the quarter under review, however, slipped 0.82% to RM2.07 billion from RM2.08 billion in the same period.

In its filing with the local bourse yesterday, the group said its service revenue was stable at RM2.05 billion, with mobile Internet revenue growth offsetting the continued decline in voice and short message service usage.

The upward repricing of its postpaid pay-per-use charges also impacted earnings.

“This quarter, Maxis took a RM16 million revenue hit from the repricing of postpaid pay-per-use charges.

“Despite that, Maxis acquired higher mobile Internet (MI) users — MI users surged to 7.6 million with MI revenue growing 6.7% quarter-on-quarter and MI share of mobile revenue improved to 30%, driven by momentum gained from worry-free propositions and higher smartphone penetration,” Maxis said.

The telecommunications service provider also declared an 8 sen interim single-tier tax-exempt dividend for the quarter — to be paid on Dec 26 — translating into a total dividend payment of 24 sen for the year. Its shares will trade ex-dividend on Nov 26, 2014.

Meanwhile, in the nine months to Sept 30, Maxis’ net profit declined 6.8% to RM1.38 billion from RM1.48 billion, while cumulative revenue fell 9.2% to RM6.23 billion from RM6.86 billion.

This was despite a 13.7% year-on-year reduction in the group’s total cost base for the period under review.

Looking ahead, Maxis chief executive officer Morten Lundal said in a media statement that the company, which had invested RM337 million for capital expenditure for 3QFY14, is on track to spend more than RM1 billion for the year.

He said Maxis’ modernised tele- communication network would reach more than 75% of the local population before year-end.

“We are progressing well with our transformation journey. Our 3QFY14 numbers were broadly stable, but with operational drivers showing an upward trend,” said Lundal.

Maxis managed to turn around its prepaid segment, with a total of 9.08 million subscriptions as at 3QFY14, up 0.43% from 9.04 million subscriptions in the previous quarter, which had fallen 2.12% from 9.24 million in the 1QFY14.

The group said it has also added new subscribers to its postpaid segment at the same time, with postpaid subcribers now at 2.84 million from 2.83 million in 2QFY14.

Maxis closed 6 sen higher at RM6.90 yesterday, bringing its market capitalisation to RM51.49 billion.

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on November 14, 2014.