Telefonica on Thursday raised its full-year revenue guidance after reporting a surge in second quarter sales and profit.
The Spanish incumbent generated revenue of €11.9 billion in the three months to 30 June, up 12% on the same period a year earlier. The telco attributed the performance to healthy demand for mobile data and strong customer growth driven by the acquisitions of Brazil’s GVT and the owner of Canal+ Spain, Distribuidora de Televisión Digital (DTS).
GVT and DTS are "two key assets that are going to contribute in strengthening our presence in both markets and leadership in quality services, and will contribute to the generation of future synergies reinforcing our potential for growth in both cases," said César Alierta, executive chairman of Telefonica, in a statement.
Operating income before depreciation and amortisation (OI BDA) grew 6.8% to €3.7 billion, while net income surged to €1.9 billion from €1.1 billion.
In Telefonica’s domestic market, revenue declined slightly year-on-year, dropping to €2.97 billion from €3 billion. Germany turned in another strong quarter, growing revenue to €1.95 billion from €1.16 billion. Its Latin American business including Brazil, generated revenue of €6.4 billion, up from €5.95 billion.
At the end of June, Telefonica had 253.6 million mobile connections excluding machine-to-machine (M2M), up from 225.7 million a year earlier. Fixed connections swelled to 323 million from 285.3 million, and pay TV subscribers almost doubled to 8 million, thanks to the GVT and DTS deals.
Telefonica’s second quarter figures follow on from a similarly-promising set of results in the first quarter, when group revenue increased 12.6% on the previous year.
"The strength of the evolution of the business in the first half of the year, coupled with our positioning in order to capture growth opportunities in the coming quarters, have led us to revise our objectives upwards for 2015," said Alierta.
The company now expects full-year revenue to grow by 9.5%, compared to an earlier forecast of 7%.
