Q3 Results: Reliance Jio Profit Surges On Higher Subscriber Base

Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd.’s profit rose in the December-ended quarter aided by growing subscriber base.

Net profit of the telecom operator rose 22 percent sequentially to Rs 831 crore in the October-December period, according to filings by its parent Reliance Industries Ltd. This surpassed the Rs 788 crore analysts’ consensus estimate compiled by BloombergQuint. The company’s subscriber base breached the 280-million mark during the quarter.

Revenue rose 12.37 percent quarter-on-quarter to Rs 10,383 crore. That compares with the estimated Rs 10,449 crore.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation rose 13.44 percent to Rs 4,052 crore. The company’s margin swelled 37 basis points on a quarterly basis to 39.03 percent for the December-ended period.

The Mukesh Ambani-led telecom operator’s average revenue per user fell for the fifth straight quarter to Rs 130, which is 1.52 percent lower than the September-ended period. The company added over one crore subscribers in October, while the user base of its rivals Bharti Airtel Ltd. and Vodafone Idea Ltd. declined.

Reliance’s Den-Hathway Deal

Reliance Industries had announced in October a Rs 5,200-crore deal with Den Networks Ltd. and Hathway Cable & Datacom Ltd. to expand in the broadband and direct-to-home service industry. The company said in a filing its awaiting regulatory nod for the deal completion.

Post-completion of the deal, Reliance and Jio will strengthen the business model of 27,000 local cable operators that are aligned with Den and Hathway across 750 cities, the company said.

Key Highlights Of The Quarter:

• Jio’s average data consumption per user per month was at 10.8 GB.
• The average voice consumption was at 794 minutes per user per month
• Video consumption drove most of the usage, increasing to 460 crore hours per month.
• Total wireless data traffic amounted to 864 crore GB.