Vodafone CEO Anne O'Leary has predicted a 1Gbps Ireland where stable, high-speed connectivity will be universally available
Vodafone has said it is working towards a vision of Ireland as a 1Gbps society, as it reported service and fixed-line revenues were up for its 2015/16 financial year.
Vodafone today (17 May) reported total service revenues of €953.7m for the year, up 1.9pc, driven by improving mobile trends, such as the uptake of 4G.
Fixed business revenues were also up 12.3pc for the year to €214.7m, as the company’s fixed customer base increased 17,400 year-on-year to 239,000 subscribers.
‘Our vision is that Ireland should be a gigabit society, where there is even faster and more reliable connectivity right across the country, no matter where your location’
– ANNE O’LEARY, VODAFONE
Overall, Vodafone reported it has 2.29m customers, with its mobile contract base up 41,000.
The mobile network said that mobile data usage is up 72pc year-on-year due to 1m 4G devices activated on its network.
Earlier this year, Vodafone launched Vodafone TV, its initial move into quad play, with more than 100 TV and radio channels.
Strategic investments
The company also launched a €450m joint venture with ESB called SIRO, which aims to deliver 1Gbps broadband to an initial 50 towns.
Also during the year, Vodafone invested €60m in a new European sales centre in Carrickmines, Dublin, as well as €7m in a new data centre.
“Our strategic and investment programmes for 2015/16 proceeded as planned. This included the launch of a partnership with ESB on SIRO and the introduction of LightSpeed Broadband,” said Vodafone Ireland CEO Anne O’Leary.
“We completed those programmes while continuing to ensure that our customers received best-in-class mobile network performance.
“Over the past 15 years, Vodafone Ireland has invested €1bn in our network and services and plans to invest in excess of €200m across fixed, mobile and in our IT transformation programme.
“In 2016/17, we will continue to invest, listen to what our customers want and be a pioneer in network performance.
“Our vision is that Ireland should be a gigabit society, where there is even faster and more reliable connectivity right across the country, no matter where your location,” O’Leary said.
Vodafone Ireland’s parent company, Vodafone Group, reported a 2pc increase in service revenues to £41bn and EBITDA was up 2.7pc to £11.7bn for the full year.
