O2 ups customer numbers and service revenues in Q2


27 Jul 2006

O2’s Irish customer base swelled by 6,000 in its second quarter to 1,599,000, up from 1,593,000 in the first quarter of the year.

Key performance indicators for the three-month period to 30 June show that the country’s second-largest mobile operator grew service revenues by 3.3pc year on year. Average monthly minutes of use in the quarter were up 8pc to 237, from 220 in the first quarter of 2006.

Monthly average revenue per user (ARPU) was a massive €46. O2 said this was a relatively static figure that compares with €45 for Q1 and €46 for the same period last year. Subscribers on post-paid contracts earned €88 in average revenue for O2, marginally up from €87 in the previous quarter but down from €92 for the same period in 2005. The monthly ARPU for pre-pay customers remained static at €29 when compared with the last quarter and with the same period in 2005.

Data revenue as a percentage of overall service revenue was 20.74pc in Q2, up from 20.44pc in the same period last year. Some 392 million text messages were sent during the three-month period, up by almost 10pc (9.8pc) on the same period last year, up from 357 million.

Paul Whelan, O2 Ireland’s chief financial officer, said in a statement: “The O2 Ireland business continues to deliver a strong performance.” He called the Irish market “fiercely competitive” and said that the company was pleased at its expanding customer base.

Interestingly, Whelan said that O2 garnered almost 13,000 post-pay customers in the last quarter alone, suggesting massive levels of churn among pre-pay customers given that total customer numbers in the quarter rose by less than half that figure.

By Gordon Smith