Telecom Italia gets Brazilian boost

Italian carrier Telecom Italia recorded a 13.4 per cent year on year increase in consolidated net profit for the first quarter to reach Eur744m (ВЈ511m). On the back of strong growth in Brazil and the broadband sector, revenues also increased 6.5 per cent year on year to Eur7.48bn.

The wireline division delivered first quarter revenues of Eur4.47bn, up 2.6 per cent on 2005, with Telecoms Italia’s broadband lines in Italy topping 6.1 million at the end of April. Considering 1.5 million broadband lines in France, Germany and Holland, and increase of 202,000 from the end of 2005, Telecom Italia’s total portfolio of broadband lines in Europe stood at over 7.6 million at the end of March.

The operator’s mobile subscriber base increased to 50.7 million during the quarter, with the operator topping 30 million connections in Italy.

Revenues at TIM Brasil increased 15.9 per cent year on year to Real2.2bn (ВЈ574m), while TIM’s GSM subscriber base reached 17.8 million.

Cesar Bachelet, analyst with Ovum, said that within its domestic market, “Telecom Italia keeps running harder to stand still…and is therefore increasingly dependent upon its overseas ventures, notably its Brazilian mobile operations, for growth.”

But, “as its main source of growth is highly vulnerable, the group’s focus in the years ahead will have to be the successful integration of its domestic fixed and mobile units. Capitalising on the resulting synergies and savings will be key to restoring the bottom line,” the analyst said.

Tags: Brazil, Italy, Regional, Telecom Italia, TIM Brasil

This entry was posted on May 11th, 2006 and is filed under Operators. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or Trackback from your own site.