Idea Cellular posts 91 percent jump in Q4 net profit on rising data volume

Telecom operator Idea Cellular on Monday posted its earnings report for Q4. The company reported an over 91 percent jump in consolidated net profit at Rs. 589.77 crores for the last quarter of 2013-14, on the back of expansion in both voice minutes and mobile data volume.

The company had posted a profit after tax of Rs. 308.18 crores for the same period a year ago.

Total consolidated revenue of the company during the January-March quarter rose by 16.2 percent to Rs. 7,043.82 crores, from Rs. 6,061.38 crores in the year-ago period.

On quarterly basis the company registered growth of 6.5 percent in total revenue from Rs. 6,613.06 crores posted in third quarter of 2013-14.

"The 6.5 percent sequential quarterly revenue growth in Q4 FY14 is driven by sharp expansion of voice minutes at the rate of 8.6 percent to 157.1 billion minutes and mobile data volume (2G+3G) growth at the rate of 31 percent to 27.3 billion MB versus Q3 FY14, indicating strong consumer demand for Idea mobile telephony," Idea Cellular said in a statement.

On yearly basis, consolidated net profit jumped 94.65 percent at Rs. 1,967.82 crores for FY'14 compared to Rs. 1,010.93 crores posted at the end of FY'13.

The consolidated revenue increased by over 18 percent to Rs. 26,518.91 crores for FY'14, from Rs. 22,457.65 posted at the end of FY'13.

The company clocked 1.77 crores net subscribers that were active in FY14 against 1.49 crores net subscribers in FY13.

Idea Cellular total subscriber stood at 13.79 crores by the end of March 31 2014, the statement said.

The average revenue of company from subscriber increased to Rs. 173 from Rs. 169 on quarterly basis.

The company witnessed decline of 2.8 percent in average revenue per minute from consumers to 43.6 paise from 44.9 paise, however, the company improved 'non voice revenue' share to 16.5 percent from 16.1 in Q3 FY'14 led by data (mobile internet) growth. Shares of Idea Cellular closed at Rs. 140.75 apiece, up by 0.18 percent, at BSE on Monday.