Telecom operator Bharti Airtel on Monday reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 759 crore for the fourth quarter of financial year ended on March 31, 2021, and an annual turnover of more than Rs 1 lakh crore for the first time. The company had posted a loss of Rs 5,237 crore in the same period a year ago.
The consolidated revenue of Bharti Airtel increased by 11.9 per cent to Rs 25,747 crore during the reported quarter compared to Rs 23,019 crore in the corresponding quarter of 2019-20.
India revenue of Bharti Airtel increased by 10 per cent during the quarter to Rs 18,337.8 crore from Rs 16,734.3 crore a year ago. Mobile services business of Bharti Airtel grew by 9 per cent to Rs 14,079.7 crore during the period under review.
Our services are the digital oxygen that the country needs in this challenging time as we experience a vicious second wave of Covid-19. I am grateful to our people who are doing all they can to strengthen our network experience and serve our customers braving massive odds. It is this relentless focus on customer obsession that has allowed us to deliver another consistent quarter in terms of performance,” Bharti Airtel MD and CEO for India and South Asia Gopal Vittal said in a statement.
He said that the enterprise segment delivered double digit growth during the quarter. The company’s capital expenditure in mobile network halved to Rs 3,739.3 crore in the quarter. However, the work-from-home trend driving data demand led to the increase of company’s investment in the fixed line services which includes broadband connection.
Bharti Airtel increased investment in home services by over three-folds to Rs 332.5 crore during January-March 2021 compared to the same quarter of previous fiscal.
“Company’s focus on re-calibrated offerings and launch of Xstream bundles, with content and unlimited internet, to accelerate penetration has resulted in the highest ever net addition of around 2.74 lakh to reach a total base of 30.7 lakh. The company has also been rapidly expanding its reach to non-wired cities via an innovative LCO partnership model, which now live in more than 200 cities,” Airtel said.
Along with the highest ever customer addition in a quarter, the “Homes Services” division of Bharti Airtel registered growth with the highest quarterly revenues in the last three years.
Airtel Africa posted over 17 per cent increase in revenue at Rs 7,601.7 crore during the reported quarter from Rs 6,488.8 crore in the corresponding quarter of 2019-20.
For the year ended March 31, 2021, Bharti Airtel narrowed its loss to Rs 15,084 crore from Rs 32,183 crore it had recorded at the end of 2019-20.
The annual revenue of Bharti Airtel crossed Rs 1 lakh crore (1,00,616 crore) in the financial year 2020-21. The company had recorded annual revenue of Rs 84,676 crore in 2019-20.
The India unit of the company reported an increase of 18 per cent in annual revenue to Rs 72,308.3 crore in FY 2021 compared to Rs 61,078.7 crore in FY 2020. The Africa business of Bharti Airtel posted a 19 per cent increase in annual revenue to Rs 28,863.3 crore in FY 2021 compared to Rs 24,217.1 crore a year ago.
Bharti Airtel’s global customer base stood at around 47 crore at the end of reported quarter.
The company registered a 13.1 per cent growth in India customer base to over 35 crore in the reported quarter from 30.9 crore it had a year ago. The mobile services average revenue per person declined by 5.8 per cent to Rs 145 in January-March 2021 from Rs 154 in the same period a year ago.
The consolidated net debt for the company including the impact of leases stood at Rs 1,48,507.6 crore as on March 31, 2021.
