Kolkata: A pronounced decline in Vodafone Idea’s (Vi) customer losses in the December quarter has been driven partly by a revival in the usage of multiple SIMs, or `mobile connections’, with the rural migrant workforce returning to cities after the easing of lockdown curbs and reactivating their mobile phones.
Analysts also said that the telco was showing improvements in its financials, but needed to further stem
subscriber losses by raising funds quickly and stepping up capex investments.
They added that the deceleration in Vi’s subscriber losses was also helped by
Reliance Jio’s lowest-ever net user additions in the fiscal third quarter amid the slowdown in the market leader’s
JioPhone customer gains.
Vi managed to limit customer losses in the December quarter to 2 million -- from 8.1 million in the previous one -- and also narrowed its net loss to Rs 4,540.8 crore compared with Rs 7,203.4 crore in the second quarter of FY21, helped by a cost-optimisation plan and 3.6 million 4G user adds. Its lower quarterly loss was also helped by a Rs 2,118.9-crore one-time gain on account of the sale of its 11.15% stake in Indus to the recently merged Bharti Infratel-Indus Towers entity.
“Vi managed to rein in customer losses, primarily as multiple-SIM usage seems to be happening once more with migrants returning to cities and using their feature phones regularly,” said Nitin Soni, senior director at global ratings agency, Fitch.
Thin on data
A majority of Vi’s customers use feature phones and over 55% of the telco’s 269.8 million users don’t have broadband connections.
“Vi is showing some improving trend with lower subscriber losses to just 2 million, higher 4G net adds and a rise in data usage, but this is still not enough as it is still losing customers,” said ICICI Securities in a note.
The brokerage also said the “loss of 0.4 million postpaid users (to 20.8 million) partly offset Vi’s gains on ARPU front.” It, though, added that "Vi's cash Ebitda at Rs 2,100 crore benefitted from amortisation of subscriber acquisition cost of Rs 330 crore the over the (expected) lifetime of subscribers, which was earlier expensed in P&L".
The telco’s average revenue per user (ARPU) - a key performance parameter – was higher at Rs 121 compared with Rs 119 in the September quarter.
Analysts said Vi needs to enhance tariffs soon to boost operational cash flows and also close its planned fundraise quickly to be able to invest more strongly in its 4G network to leverage the gains of reducing customer losses.
Edelweiss Securities said that “high debt is constraining Vi’s network investments, which is crucial for arresting subscriber decline.” The telco would need to spend much more on networks to compete effectively with Jio and Airtel, Edelweiss said.
Vi’s capex spends in the December quarter at Rs 970 crore were less than a seventh of Airtel’s Rs 6,860 crore and well below Jio’s Rs 5,653 crore.
Burgeoning debt
Analysts said Vi’s Rs 1,17,080 crore net debt is unsustainable and a fund infusion is critical to enable the telco to invest in networks and bounce back.
“Capex for Vi is contingent on fund-raising and any delay may hurt it further,” said ICICI Securities, adding that the telco requires a steep tariff hike soon to boost operational cash flow.
Last September, Vi had announced a Rs 25,000-crore fundraising plan via a mix of debt and equity. In recent months, it has been negotiating a $2-billion creditline with an Oak Hill Advisors-led global lenders’ consortium as part of that plan.
Vi’s CEO Ravinder Takkar reiterated on Saturday that the telco is in “active discussions with potential investors” to line up the planned funding.
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