Thailand’s second largest mobile operator, dtac, suffered a dismal opening quarter, with profit falling sharply, and service revenue and customer base both contracting despite strong data revenue and 4G subscriber growth.

The operator’s net profit for Q1 2017 plunged 82 per cent year-on-year to THB229 million ($6.64 million), which it attributed to higher depreciation and amortisation from its network expansion.

Total revenue dropped 8.9 per cent to THB19.7 billion due mainly to lower handset sales. Service revenue during the January to March period fell 3.1 per cent year-on-year to THB17.1 billion. A 26 per cent increase in data revenue to THB10.4 billion couldn’t offset a 28 per cent drop in interconnect turnover and a 34 per cent decline in mobile voice revenue.

Handset sales were down 36 per cent year-on-year to THB2.45 billion due to weaker iPhone demand, and international roaming revenue fell 8.7 per cent to THB357 million.

Data revenue accounted for 64 per cent of service revenue (excluding interconnect), up from 50 per cent in Q1 2016.

Prepaid loses
Dtac’s user base fell 4.6 per cent year-on-year to 24.3 million in Q1. It added 195,000 post paid subscribers during the quarter, but lost 365,000 prepaid users. Since Q1 2016, its market share dropped 3 percentage points to 26 per cent.

Its 4G user base doubled over the past year to 5.9 million, with LTE subs accounting for 24 per cent of its mobile customers at end-March.

Post paid ARPU rose 5.4 per cent year-on-year to THB559, while prepaid ARPU dropped 13 per cent to THB153.

Capex decreased slightly to THB4.5 billion. The operator deployed 2,500 3G and 4G base stations on its 2.1GHz network during the quarter. It had 23,200 4G sites at the end of Q1.

For the full year 2017, capex is forecast at THB17 billion to THB20 billion, and dtac expects service revenue and EBITDA to remain at the same level as 2016.