Bangladesh operator Grameenphone suffered declines in revenue and profit in Q2, as the Covid-19 (coronavirus) crisis curbed voice usage and subscriber acquisition activities, putting downward pressure on ARPU.

CEO Yasir Azman said the impact of the pandemic had driven Grameenphone to “drastically change our way of work and how we serve our customers” over the past four months.

In addition to Covid-19, he said it faced challenging weather and regulatory conditions, all of which combined to hit its overall performance in Q2.

Net profit slumped 24 per cent year-on-year to BDT7.3 billion ($86.1 million). Turnover dropped 8.2 per cent to BDT33.1 billion, despite data revenue growing 16.7 per cent.

Its mobile subscriber base fell 1.1 per cent to 74.5 million, while ARPU declined 8.2 per cent to BDT146.

On the positive side, it added 6.8 million 4G subscribers to end June with 15.2 million.

Capex fell to BDT2.5 billion from BDT3.8 billion in Q2 2019, as it added 132 4G base stations, though its overall number of sites grew 38 per cent to 10,351, with population coverage at 77.1 per cent.