The net profit of Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company PJSC (EITC) has risen to AED 283 million in Q3 2021 in spite of higher depreciation and amortisation charges.
The revenues have grown 6.9% to AED 2,874 million in Q3 2021 on sustained demand for broadband services and 5G handsets.
More importantly, mobile services continued its recovery thanks to a buoyant postpaid segment. EBITDA amounted to AED 1,100 million due to cost optimization which helped contain margin pressure from direct costs.
According to financial results, mobile customer base reached 6.5 million. The postpaid segment remains resilient with net-adds of 13,000. The postpaid customer base grew to 1.3 million as a result of an improved digital Customer Experience as well as enhancements to the Power Plans.
The prepaid customer base declined to 5.2 million subscribers due to a combination of summer seasonality and flight restrictions brought by the COVID-19 Delta variant.
The company ended the quarter with 331,000 broadband customers. Demand from the Enterprise segment is also returning.
The capital deployment plan is bearing fruits. The company’s 5G network covers 90 percent of the population.
“I am very pleased that consumer and corporate confidence are on the mend,” Fahad Al Hassawi, CEO, said. “This quarter is an inflection point for mobile service revenues: we renewed with nominal growth (+0.7% quarter-on-quarter) after three consecutive quarters of decline.