Russia’s MTS ended the second quarter with 7,294,000 residential triple play (pay-TV, broadband and fixed-line telephony) subscribers, down from 7,844,000 a year earlier.
In its latest set of results, the company says that this decline reflects the migration of pay-TV subscribers from analogue to digital, “which results in (the) defection of certain types of subscribers.”
However, it also points out that the migration of pay-TV subscribers to MTS’s digital TV platform, along with the upselling of broadband subscribers and rising share of double and triple play subscribers in the customer base, has contributed to growth in ARPU, up from R306 in Q2 2013 to R330 in this year’s second quarter.
The MTS group, whose main business is offering mobile services in Russia, had revenues of R98.9 billion (€2.05 billion) in Q2, up from R97.5 billion a year earlier.
Its OIBDA was meanwhile R43.2 billion (R44.4 billion) and net income R21.1 billion (R29 billion).
MTS expects revenue growth of over 1% this year.
Although growth in Russia itself will be around 4-5%, its performance in Ukraine will be impacted by the “ongoing macroeconomic weakness and the uncertain political environment”.
