Bharti Airtel Q3 results: Net profit at Rs 853.6 cr, quarterly revenue touches record high

Bharti Airtel (Airtel) on Wednesday reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 853.6 crore in October-December quarter of the ongoing financial year as against a net loss of Rs 1,035.3 crore in the year-ago period. The company had posted a net loss of Rs 763.2 crore in the preceding July-September quarter.

The company's revenue rose 24.2 per year-on-year (YoY) to Rs 26,518 crore during the December quarter, its highest-ever quarterly revenue, led by strong customer additions.

Its mobile ARPU (average revenue per user) rose to Rs 166 in October-December from Rs 135 in the year-ago quarter as it focused on acquiring quality customers as well as secular upgrading of customers to data, Airtel said in a release.

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Airtel's EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) rose 32.8 per cent YoY to Rs 12,178 crore, while EBITDA margin expanded 464 basis points to 45.9 per cent.

The revenue of India mobile business rose 32.4 YoY to Rs 14,778.8 crore on improved realisation and strong customer additions, while Airtel Business revenue jumped 9.2 per cent to Rs 3,621.5 crore on demand for connectivity and solutions across global and domestic businesses. Airtel's Africa business saw a 23 per cent growth in revenue in constant currency terms.

"The company continues to see strong traction in its post-paid business also added about 700K post-paid customers this quarter. We continue to invest ahead of the curve to create capacities and provide a brilliant experience to our customers," Airtel said.

The company added 1.29 crore 4G customers during the quarter to take its total 4G customer base to 16.56 crore. Its overall customer base stood at 45.8 crore across 16 countries, while capital expenditure during December quarter was at Rs 6,864 crore.

"Despite the unprecedented volatility that we have confronted through the year, we delivered another strong performance this quarter. This consistency in performance was across every part of our portfolio, as reflected in market share growth across all our business segments," Gopal Vittal, MD and CEO of India & South Asia, Bharti Airtel, said.

"We are also proud to have become India's first telco to have demonstrated a LIVE 5G service over a commercial network in Hyderabad city. This reaffirms our strategy to win with quality customers," Vittal added.

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