India’s third largest telco Vodafone Idea on Tuesday reported a consolidated loss of Rs 7,990 crore for the third quarter ended December 31, 2022. The company had posted a loss of Rs 7,234.1 crore in the corresponding quarter last fiscal.
The debt-ridden telco reported its revenue growth at 9.3 per cent year-on-year (YoY), which was aided by improvement in subscriber mix, tariff intervention and 4G subscriber additions. The consolidated revenue from operations rose to Rs 10,620.6 crore from Rs 9,717.3 crore in the December 2021 quarter.
Vodafone Idea’s capex spend for the quarter stood at Rs 7500 crore as opposed to Rs 1210 crore in Q2FY23.
The company’s EBITDA was up 2 per cent at Rs 4,180.8 crore as opposed to Rs 4,097.5 crore.
Commenting on debts, Vodafone Idea in its regulatory filing said, “The total gross debt (excluding lease liabilities and including interest accrued but not due) as of December 31, 2022 stands at Rs 2,228.9 billion, comprising of deferred spectrum payment obligations of Rs 1,398 billion and AGR liability of Rs 699.1 billion that are due to the Government, and debt from banks and financial institutions of Rs. 131.9 billion. With Cash & cash equivalents of Rs 1.6 billion, the net debt stands at Rs 2,227.3 billion.”
Its debt from banks and financial institutions stood at Rs 13,190 crore.
The company said that its revenue per user, a key performance indicator of telecom operators, improved by 17.4 percent on a year-over-year basis to Rs 135 during Q3 FY23, aided by tariff hikes and migration of subscribers to unlimited tariff plans.
Meanwhile, the telco reported a decline of subscribers from 23.44 crore in the September 2022 quarter to 22.86 crore in December 2022 quarter.
In other development, a leading media house reported that Aditya Birla Group was looking to raise funds for Vodafone Idea at the promoter level. This would be an equity infusion into the telco.
The Aditya Birla Group is reportedly in talks with international banks for raising term debt to subscribe to a preferential allotment of shares. The funds raised would be partly utilised for Rs 5,000-crore equity infusion by the promoters into the telco.