Telecommunications group Vodacom on Thursday reported a slight decline in the number of active customers on its South Africa-based network, while its international operations reported a rise in customers during the three months to December.
The JSE-listed group added almost one-million customers to its network during the December quarter, with active customer numbers reaching nearly 51-million.
The South African operations recorded a 0.7% drop to 30.5-million customers during the three months under review, from 30.8-million in the previous quarter.
However, this represented an 11.7% increase on the 21.8-million customers as at December 2011.
Vodacom’s international operations recorded a 5.3% quarter-on-quarter and 13% year-on-year rise in active customer numbers. The operations added one-million customers in the December quarter, reaching 20.4-million.
Further, the telecommunications group recorded a 5.1% quarter-on-quarter hike in revenue for the three months to December, reaching R18.3-billion from R17.4-billion in the three months ended September 2012.
Revenue from the group’s South African operations reached R15.5-billion during the quarter under review, up 7.3% on the R14.4-billion earned during the prior quarter. Service revenue increased to R12.5-billion during the quarter – a 4.2% increase from the prior quarter’s R12-billion.
Vodacom’s international operations, however, recorded a 6% fall in both revenue and service revenue to R2.9-billion and R2.8-billion respectively in the December quarter. This was in comparison with revenue of R3-billion and service revenue of R2.9-billion earned in the September 2012 quarter.