France was the star performer for Altice’s European operations in the second quarter. What is more, the number of customers in the country increased by over 500,000 in the first half of the year.
Results published by the company show that Altice France’s B2C fixed base grew for the second quarter in a row, with 13,000 net additions, compared to losses of 16,000 in Q2 2017. Within this, there was a particularly strong performance from fibre/cable, growing by 56,000, or 60% more than in Q2 2017. Meanwhile, in Portugal the B2C fixed base grew year-on-year in Q2 for the first time in over five years, and for the third quarter in a row. The number of unique customer net additions in Q2 was 6,000, compared to a loss of 12,000 in Q2 2017. The number of fibre/cable customers grew by 46,000 in Q2, compared to 33,000 in Q2 2017.
Elsewhere, there was no growth in the B2C fixed base in both French Overseas Territories (FOT) and Israel. However, fixed ARPU in Israel (€50.2) was higher than in FOT (€44.7), Portugal (€42.2) or France (€32.1).
All told, Altice Europe invested €773 million in Q2, compared to €861 million a year earlier.
Consolidated revenues at Altice France in Q2 amounted to €2,506.3 million, compared to €2,685.8 million a year earlier. Adjusted EBITDA – Capex was €397.8 million (€1,051.6 million). Consolidated revenues in Portugal were €503 million (€528.9 million) and Adjusted EBITDA €116 million (€153.2 million).
Commenting on the results, Patrick Drahi, founder of Altice Europe, said: “Since the beginning of 2018, Altice Europe has continuously delivered on its operational turnaround plan, showing continuous improvements in subscriber trends. In France, we have gained more than half a million customers already since the beginning of this year. Altice Europe is already winning back market shares and will return to growth. Our customers remain our first priority, and we have a unique asset base with expanding premium proprietary infrastructure in both fiber and mobile and content assets to further improve their satisfaction.
“This quarter, we set up new tower partnerships in France and Portugal with prestigious partners, KKR, Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners and Horizon Equity Partners. We will create a leading European tower business, including the number 1 in France. Both tower businesses will be uniquely positioned to grow as they provide increasingly important infrastructure services to operators in both markets. These transactions underline the significant underlying value of Altice Europe’s business and assets, which is also unique in its fibre proprietary expanding infrastructure.
“In parallel, we have successfully refinanced part of our debt and made significant further progress on the execution of our non-core asset disposal program, strengthening further our long-term balance sheet position. Last and very importantly, we now have a strong and unified management team which is leading the Group to full recovery.”