China Mobile is now serving over 415 million subscribers, up by nearly 25% or 45 million users, over the past 12 months. The net increase of new subscribers per month topped 7.5 million.
For the six months ended 30 June 2008, the Group's total voice usage volume reached 1,160.47 billion minutes and the average minutes of usage (MOU) was 496 minutes. Average revenue per user per month (ARPU) was RMB 84. This compares to ARPU of RMB 88 a year earlier.
China Mobile said the combination of economic growth in China, rising consumer purchasing power, the continuous development of the rural economy and the acceleration of the information society throughout the country is driving a tremendous demand for telecommunications and information services.
Some other key operating trends:
- Nearly half of subscriber growth in 1H08 came from rural markets
- Color Ring revenue reached RMB 6.275 billion, up 25% over last year.
- WAP revenue reached RMB 5.92 billion, up 19.3% over last year.
- MMS revenue reached RMB 1.365 billion, up 91% over last year.
- For the six months ended 30 June 2008, China Mobile's operating revenue continued to grow, reaching RMB196,460 million, representing an increase of 17.9 per cent. over the same period of last year.
- Profit attributable to shareholders reached RMB54,849 million -- an increase of 44.7 per cent over the same period of last year due partly to change in PRC enterprise income tax rate.
- Margin of profit attributable to shareholders reached 27.9 per cent.. EBITDA reached RMB104,361 million, representing an increase of 16.2 per cent. over the same period of last year while basic earnings per share reached RMB2.74, an increase of 44.2 per cent. over the same period of last year.
