Vodafone adds 17,000 customers in Ireland, 132,000 in UK
Talk-happy Irish mobile phone users continue to contribute to phone company profits, according to key performance indicators released today by Vodafone.
Some 17,000 more people signed up with the company in the 12 months to June 2004, bringing total customer base up in Ireland to 1.881 million. A total of 72% of customers have opted for the pre-paid user model.
Vodafone UK added 132,000 net customers in the quarter, taking the total base to 14.2 million registered customers, an increase of almost 7% since last year. Vodafone said today that churn had remained stable due to a range of loyalty initiatives.
Irish users again recorded a high volume of time spent on the mobile, with an average revenue per user (ARPU) of €591. Customers in Malta were least tied to their mobiles, contributing just €167 per user to the total.
Blended annual ARPU among UK customers increased to £314 (€475.20) from £309 (€467.66) for the year to March 2004.
Arun Sarin, Chief Executive of Vodafone, commented: “Overall we feel we have made a very strong start to this year. We have recorded good performances in both customer and revenue growth. With over 139 million proportionate customers, our business is progressing well, despite a tougher competitive environment in some markets.
"Data revenues continue to increase helped by Vodafone live! Where we now have over 9 million controlled customers. These KPI’s are in line with our expectations and we are therefore reiterating our guidance for the year to March 2005.”
The key performance indicators mentioned today by Vodafone include:
- 3.1 million organic net additions, and 2.7 million additions from stake changes, increasing the proportionate customer base to 139.2 million;
- Blended annual ARPU up €1 to €362 in Italy, down €1 at €309 in Germany and ¥2,330 to ¥78,365 in Japan, compared to March 2004. ARPU in the UK was up £5 to £314 (€475.20), including a further £4 uplift from the acquisition of Singlepoint;
- Total data revenues increased to 16.3% of controlled service revenues for the year to June 2004 from 15.0% for the year to June 2003; controlled data revenues for the quarter up 13% on an organic basis on the same quarter last year;
- Nine million controlled Vodafone live!™ customers at the end of June 2004, with a further 1.3 million customers in non-controlled operations; • Mobile Connect Card sales in controlled operations increased to over 300,000, including over 50,000 with 3G capability.
But lower spending by new users meant ARPU in Germany declined, while higher market penetration and growth in pre-paid customers kept revenues under pressure in Japan.
Shares in the company fell to a 10-month low of 116.25p on Friday as investors fretted about the weak Japanese market and the impact of rolling out of third-generation services on profitability.
Analysts hoped the company would use today’s statement to announce a restructuring of its operations in Japan where service revenues fell by 6% during the quarter.
But Vodafone remained tight-lipped on its plans in Japan, although it confirmed its outlook for the company during the year to March.
Elsewhere, the group’s Vodafone live! picture-based service contributed to income from data services, climbing more than 16% during the year to June.
