Singapore Operator Sees Shrinking Subscriber Base

Singapore's MobileOne (M1) has reported that it ended last year with 1.246 million customers made up of some 809,500 postpaid customers and 436,200 prepaid customers. This is the first time that the company has reported a fall in its subscriber base. Whilst the contract customer base had risen slightly from 807,000 to 809,500 - the company say a significant fall in their PrePay base from 451,000 to 436,200.

Despite the drop in customers, its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) for the full year increased by 13.5% over the previous year, to US$204 million. EBITDA margin on service revenue rose by 4.2% points year on year to 47.2%. Profit after tax for the year went up by 4.6% to US$99 million while service revenue grew by 3.5% to US$433 million. Non-voice services continued to see healthy growth and contributed almost 20% of average revenue per user. Revenue from international call services grew by 9.3% to US$74.8 million, contributing 15.7% of total operating revenue for the year.

Neil Montefiore, Chief Executive Officer of M1, said: "Despite challenging market conditions, we were able to meet our business and financial targets and the full year results are in accordance with our expectations. The mobile market in Singapore in the coming years will continue to present strong but interesting challenges as well as exciting opportunities. Take up in 3G is growing steadily and we should see more meaningful revenue from our 3G services this year. Looking ahead, we expect to perform reasonably well and, based on the current outlook, to achieve single-digit growth in net profit after tax this year."

Posted to the site on 23rd January 2006