Idea Cellular Q1 net profit jumps 28%

Telecom giant Idea Cellular Ltd posted on Tuesday a better-than-expected 28 per cent jump in quarterly profit, helped by higher data revenue, and said it would introduce 4G LTE services in 10 service areas next year.

The company's net profit stood at  Rs 930.8 crores ($146.36 million) in the quarter ended June 30, its fiscal first, compared with Rs 728 crores in the same period a year earlier.

The major drivers for the solid growtha according to the company included 44 lakh active subscriber addition, expansion of voice minutes at 5.8 per cent clocking 195.8 billion minutes on network and 15 per cent mobile data (2G+3G) volume growth to 62.7 billion MB.

The company also said in a statement. "Additionally, implementation of TRAI Roaming TTO (Sixtieth Amendment) effective from May 01, 2015 reducing the upper cap for national roaming voice call charges & SMS charges between 20 percent-75 per cent and increase in service tax rate effective from June 01, 2015 from 12.36 percent to 14 percent have also impacted the financial results for this quarter."

The company, part of the Aditya Birla conglomerate, posted consolidated revenues of Rs 8,798 crores, 16.3 per cent higher than a year earlier.