Singaporean fixed and mobile operator M1 Limited (M1) has announced its unaudited group financial results for the nine months ended 30 September 2012. The telco booked service revenues of SGD577.4 million (USD472.5 million) during the period under review, up 2.8% year-on-year on the back of solid subscriber growth and a higher contribution from its fixed services unit. However, net income for January-September dropped by 14.1% y-o-y to SGD108.6 million, attributed in part to higher handset subsidies. M1 added however, that free cash flow jumped 46.5% to SGD169.0 million.
M1 said turnover derived from non-voice services edged up 2.1 percentage points over the year to account for 38.0% of service revenue in 9M12. The operator noted that strong demand for smartphones is fuelling this growth, adding that by 1 October 73% of all post-paid customers owned a smartphone. During the third quarter of this year the mobile arm added a net 24,000 users for a total of 2.059 million. Monthly post-paid churn improved by 1.2%, compared to 1.3% in the second quarter. The carrier also reported a total of 44,000 fibre (FTTx) customers as at 30 September 2012.
Commenting on recent developments with the group, M1 chief executive Karen Kooi said: ‘On 15 September 2012, we achieved another milestone as the first operator in South East Asia to launch nationwide 4G service. At the same time, we introduced new smartphone and mobile broadband plans with tiered data bundles. Being the only operator with nationwide 4G coverage, we saw very strong take-up of 4G handsets on our new smartphone plans.’