Vipnet achieved growth of 11.2 percent in revenue, and of 21.3 percent in profit

The second largest domestic telecom operator, Vipnet, in the first quarter of this year achieved revenue of EUR 98.4 million, with growth in revenue of 11.2 percent. In the same period, the profit before interest, amortization and depreciation (EBITDA) increased by as much as 21.3 percent to EUR 21.2 million, according to Vipnet's owner, Telekom Austria, owned by America Móvil.

In the period from January to the end of March, Vipnet increased its capital investments by 17.3 percent to EUR 17 million.

In the first quarter, Vipnet's share of mobile users decreased by 0.02 percentage points compared to the same period of the previous year, while compared to the end of last year it increased by the same amount. The company has an increase in the postpaid user segment while in all other segments the number has decreased. The number of contractual users increased 2.9 percent to 865.9 thousand users. The total number of users decreased by 0.5 percent to 1.706 million.

Average mobile spending of minutes increased by 2.1 percent, while total revenue per user in this segment increased 2.2 percent to the average monthly EUR 11.3 (ARPU).

The total churn rate is lower than at the end of last year, but also slightly higher than at the end of the first quarter of 2016, and is now 2.7 percent. 3.5 million euros and 29.3 percent were spent on retaining existing users, while for the acquisition of new users the cost increased 44.7 percent or 2.9 million euros compared to the first quarter of 2016.

In fixed telephony, fixed revenue generating units (RGU), reached 662 thousand, with a growth of 14.8 percent compared to the previous period. Fixed voice grew 17.7 percent and reached 201.2 thousand. In the broadband segment, Vipnet now has 255.1 thousand, with a growth of 20.5 percent. In the segment of Pay TV service or IPTV, Vipnet records an increase of 6.1 percent to the total of 206.1 thousand RGUs.