Robi posts 4.1% revenue growth year-on-year in first quarter

Robi Axiata Ltd, the operator of Robi mobile phone services, has recorded a revenue growth of 4.1 percent in the first quarter of the current year over the same previous period.

The data revenue grew over 170 percent.
 
The company, however, registered 8.7 percent negative quarter-on-quarter growth due to ‘political unrest and intense competition’.
 
Robi announced its financial results for the January-March period on Tuesday.
 
The company said in a media statement the year started with very challenging conditions because of political unrest impacting growth.
 
“However, despite these challenging conditions, Robi was able to acquire another 1 million new subscribers to reach 26.3 million subscribers, representing 21.3 percent subscriber market share,” it said.
 
The data revenue growth was propelled by 'significant investments' in network coupled with 'innovative data offerings' to drive 3.5G and 2.5G data usage.
 
During January-March period, Robi achieved an operating profit margin of 37.4 percent, which is ‘marginally’ lower than the previous corresponding period.
 
The decline in operating profit margin growth was caused by higher network expenses related to continued network investments, political unrest and intense competition, the statement said.
 
Post-tax profit was dented by higher depreciation resulted from investments in 2.5G and 3.5G network expansion and lower EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation).
 
Robi said its investments in network expansion were up by 28 percent year-on-year to Tk 6.4 billion.
 
The company said it contributed Tk 4.6 billion to the national exchequer in the first quarter.