Monday, November 8, 2010

Vodafone Reports Improved Revenue Trends and Outlines New Strategy

Driven by strong performance at Verizon Wireless, Vodafone reported that its Group revenue increased by 3.9% to £22.6 billion, with improved organic growth trends in all of its regions. For its recently completed fiscal Q2, Group organic service revenue increased by 2.3%, 1.2 percentage points faster than Q1, with data revenue growth of 25.9%. Group adjusted operating profit increased by 2.7% to £6.1 billion with an increased contribution from
Africa and Central Europe, Asia Pacific and Middle East and Verizon Wireless offsetting lower profit in
Europe.


Some highlights:


In Europe service revenue declined by 1.3%(*) with improvement in trends in Q2 where service revenue
declined only 0.8%(*), reflecting continued growth in Germany and the UK, an improved trend in Italy and
continuing weakness in Spain. Data revenue growth was 23.2% and fixed line growth was 4.4%.
Operating costs in Europe including Common Functions declined by 3.4%, enabling further commercial
investment. EBITDA margin declined 1.6 percentage points.


In Africa and Central Europe service revenue increased by 20.1%, reflecting favourable foreign exchange
rate movements and the impact of the acquisition of a controlling stake in Vodacom in the prior year. On
an organic basis service revenue increased by 4.8%(*), with continued growth in Turkey and Vodacom and
stable trends in most Central European operations. EBITDA margins were stable.


In Asia Pacific and Middle East service revenue increased by 22.2% reflecting a strong contribution from
India where service revenue grew by 14.7% and where we added 14.7 million customers during the
period. The regional EBITDA margin increased by nearly 2 percentage points reflecting better margins in
India as we begin to gain the benefits of scale.


At Verizon Wireless underlying service revenue growth was 6.2%, the EBITDA margin was 40.0% and data
revenue continued to grow rapidly. Free cash flow generation remained strong and net debt had reduced
to US$14.3 billion by 30 September.


On an annualised basis the Group's mobile data business has grown to nearly £5 billion and fixed line revenue, primarily broadband, has grown to over £3 billion.

Vodafone outlined the following strategy focused particularly on Europe, Africa and India:


1. Mobile data: Vodafone will focus on the rapid increase in demand for ubiquitous mobile data services
and accelerate the rate of adoption by customers in under penetrated markets.


2. Enterprise: Vodafone will further grow enterprise revenue through the introduction of new services for the
SME, SoHo and Corporate segments, increasing our addressable market and building on the momentum of Vodafone Global Enterprise and Vodafone One Net.


3. Emerging markets: Vodafone will continue to generate revenue growth from driving penetration of
mobile voice and SMS and accelerating the adoption of affordable data into our attractive markets
across India and Africa.


4. Total Communications: in Europe, Vodafone will build on our recent success in fixed broadband and continue to secure over time access to fast broadband to allow us to service the enterprise and consumer markets in a capital efficient manner.


5. New services: Vodafone will selectively expand into a number of new growth segments including
machine-to-machine services and financial mobile services.
http://www.vodafone.com