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SK Telecom, KT Freetel and LG Telecom Q3 2008 Results
The third quarter of 2008 saw SK Telecom (SKT) maintain its market leadership in almost every regard. In a highly stratified market, it was no surprise that it still had the largest subscriber base with 22.88m, compared to 14.26m for KT Freetel (KTF) and 8.14m for LG Telecom (LGT). Its dominance of the figures for quarterly net additions was also predictable given that it had topped the market for this metric for the previous seven quarters. However, it added just 131.6k new customers in Q3 08, its lowest gain since Q3 06 - the last quarter in which it failed to lead the market. KTF recorded net additions of 93.3k, up 29.8% year on year, while LGT saw its lowest figure since Q1 05 with a gain of just 66.8k.
SKT also leads the market in terms of ARPU with a figure of KRW 42.4k in Q3 08. However, this was 3.1% lower than the year-earlier figure, and with KTF recording a 4.0% increase to KRW 40.1k, SKTĂ's lead was reduced from KRW 5.2k in Q3 07 to KRW 2.3k a year later. Meanwhile, LGT fell further behind, a 3.4% yearly decline taking its Q3 08 figure to KRW 34.4k, KRW 5.7k behind KTF compared to KRW 2.9k a year earlier.
In terms of the financial figures, SKT is even more dominant. It recorded operating revenues of KRW 2,900bn, equivalent to 55.2% of the combined revenue of the three operators. This was down 0.8pp year on year but was still higher than its market share of customers, which stood at 50.5%. KTF saw 7.7% revenue growth, the best in the market, and its share of the total rose 0.9pp to 28.6% - but this was still well below its customer market share of 31.5%. It recorded revenue of KRW 1,502bn in Q3 08. LGT posted a figure of KRW 855bn, up 4.0% year on year, with its share of the total flat at 16.3% (compared to customer market share of 18.0%).
The EBITDA figures show that SKT is not only the largest, but also the most profitable operator in South Korea. Its Q3 08 figure for EBITDA of KRW 1,009bn implied a 34.8% margin, more than 5pp higher than KTFĂ's margin of 29.4% (from EBITDA of KRW 441bn). LGT remained the least profitable of the three with EBITDA of KRW 223bn, equivalent to a 26.1% margin.
Posted to the site on 5th November 2008
This article was extracted from The Mobile World Briefing, the weekly newsletter from The Mobile World.
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