Bharti Infratel, the wholly-owned telecom tower subsidiary of Bharti AIrtel, on Wednesday reported a 39 per cent growth in consolidated net profit at Rs 887 crore for the quarter ended June 30, 2019, helped by network expansion by mobile service providers.
"The tower infrastructure company had posted consolidated net profit of Rs 638 crore in the same quarter last year," Bharti Infratel said in a filing to the Bombay Stock Exchange.
The consolidated revenue, however, rose merely by 1 per cent to Rs 3,712 crore during Q1FY20, as against Rs 3,674 crore in Q1FY19.
Bharti Infratel's operating profit, or earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), jumped by 28 per cent to Rs 1,953 crore in April-June quarter of FY20, as against Rs 1,521 crore in the same quarter last fiscal. The operating free cash flow was at Rs 1,207 crore, up by 22 per cent Y-o-Y.
The consolidated expenses declined 18 per cent year-on-year to Rs 1,759.1 crore during June quarter.
Commenting on the Q1 results, Akhil Gupta, Chairman, Bharti Infratel said, "We are pleased to note that after negative trend in net co-locations for the last six consecutive quarters due to consolidation in the telecom industry, we had net additions in co-locations this quarter."
"Going forward, the company hopes that this trend would continue as the operators, post consolidation and raising of significant capital recently, will now focus on fresh rollouts of networks to increase both coverage and capacity which is the need of the hour," he added.
Last month, the Chandigarh bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) had approved the merger of Indus Towers with Bharti Infratel, which will create one of the largest telecom tower companies globally. The approval from the Department of Telecommunications for foreign direct investment (FDI) is awaited, Bharti Infratel said.
As of June 30, 2019, Bharti Infratel owned and operated 40,636 towers with 76,119 co-locations in 11 telecommunication circles, while Indus operated 123,799 towers with 231,256 co-locations in 15 telecommunication circles. With Bharti Infratel's towers and its 42 per cent interest in Indus, the company owned 92,632 towers and 173,247 co-locations in India as of June 30, 2019.
Ahead of the Q1 results, shares of Bharti Infratel closed trade at Rs 264.10, up 0.88 per cent, on the BSE on Wednesday.
Edited by Chitranjan Kumar
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