DITO’s losses pile up even as revenues rise
DITO CME Holdings Corp. ended the first half in the red due to higher costs and expenses and foreign exchange losses.
In a disclosure on Tuesday, the parent firm of DITO Telecommunity reported that its net losses attributable to parent company’s shareholders widened to P8.3 billion in the first half from P2.05 billion a year ago.
Revenues grew by over tenfold to P3.03 billion while earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization were up 26 percent to P2.79 billion.
The topline figures were driven by the 614-percent increase in the third telecommunication player’s subscriber base to 9.64 million as of end-June.
“The strong growth in DITO’s mobile subscribers in just a little over a year and a quarter from commercial launch is proof positive that there continues to be a segment of the market that prefers telco services that are no-nonsense, fast and reliable,” DITO CME president Eric Alberto said.
However, the revenues were tempered by unrealized foreign exchange losses of P7.26 billion for the period. Costs and expenses soared by 135 percent due to spending related to its commercial rollout.
The listed company said that it had drawn $1.18 billion from its $1.30-billion loan facilities from various lenders. These have maturity dates from April to October.
Last month, DITO Telecommunity announced its plan to provide satellite technology in order to expand its network reach to underserved and unserved areas where infrastructure builds are challenging or impractical.
DITO chief technology officer Rodolfo Santiago earlier said they were already talking with potential satellite service providers.
Along with this, Santiago said they are looking at building 7,000 to 7,500 towers to achieve 80 percent population coverage by the middle of 2023.
DITO Telecommunity is set to spend P50 billion to make its services available in over 840 areas across the country. INQ
