Belgium-based Mobistar was able to increase its monthly average revenue per user for the first time in three years after the mobile operator reported ARPU of €24.3 in the fourth quarter of 2014, up from €23.9 in the previous third quarter.
The company, which is majority owned by France’s Orange, partly attributed the improvement to higher mobile data usage, also adding that it has now reached h alf a million 4G customers, with 4G traffic now representing over one third of total mobile data traffic.
Core profits fell by 5.1% to €57.2 million in the Q4 period, broadly in line with the €57.4 million expected in a Reuters poll of 10 analysts. Service revenues amounted to €277.2 million in the quarter, a decline of 4.5 % or 1.1 % excluding regulatory impacts.
Mobistar was able to add 6,631 postpaid customers in the fourth quarter. Although it lost 23,000 prepaid customers, it said this was in line with market trends.
In the coming year, the company plans to stabilise its financials “in spite of still very challenging market conditions”, and reiterated the same guidance range as last year: a restated EBITDA of between €260 million and €280 million.
This guidance excludes costs related to the company’s plans to start offering fixed Internet and TV as part of a multi-service play. It is hoping to make use of regulatory changes that have forced cable operators to open up their networks, but is still waiting for more favourable wholesale rates for cable-based Internet and TV service–rates the company has said are not yet attractive enough to allow it to enter the market in a profitable way.
“We will be ready to market our disruptive internet and digital TV cable offers, once the regulators will have clarified the remaining points of the ‘retail minus’ calculation, as they committed at the end of last year,” said CEO Jean-Marc Harion.
Harion reiterated Mobistar’s ambition to become converged provider, which would allow it to compete with the multi-play offerings of rival Belgacom.
“Thanks to the engagement of all Mobistar team members, we are entering the current year with optimism and therefore I am very excited about our long-term prospects,” Harion added.
