Release of 18.10.2022
In the third quarter of the 2022 financial year, A1 Telekom Austria Group managed to increase both service revenues (+5.5%) and equipment revenues (+15.9%). The former grew on the basis of strong demand for high-bandwith products, successful upselling measures and positive roaming effects due to increased travelling. The latter benefitted from a better supply of devices,from a large project in Austria as well as the first time consolidation of STEMO (Bulgaria). Favorable exchange rate developments supported revenue growth by EUR 14 mn.
This strong result came amid an increasingly challenging macroeconomic environment. Energy costs have been rising strongly driving inflation. A1 Telekom Austria Group cannot escape this development. In particular electricity costs went up strongly in Q3 compared to Q2 (+19.6% to EUR 37 mn). The management expects this trend to continue and also affect other cost items. A focus lies on workforce costs as the collective bargaining process in Austria is expected to be concluded later this year. The situation in the supply chain has improved somewhat, but is still being closely monitored.
Therefore, the management has launched efficiency measures to mitigate the increase in costs. Furthermore, contractual opportunities to increase prices in line with the consumer price index (price indexation) are being seized.
Revenues are still forecasted to increase by around 3%, driven by continued solid service revenues in basically all markets and strong results in mobile and solutions & connectivity. This revenue forecast is based on the initial assumption that the Belarusian ruble would depreciate by an average of 5% to 10% against the euro in financial year 2022. Based on the actual exchange rate development in Q1-Q3 and assuming that the exchange rate remains at the level of September 30, 2022 until the end of the year, a positive impact on revenue of an additional 1-1.5% is expected.