BELGRADE (Serbia), May 5 (SeeNews) – Norwegian telecommunications group Telenor said on Wednesday the operating profit of its Serbian wireless unit fell to 44 million Norwegian crowns ($7.27 million/5.65 million euro) in the first quarter of 2010 from 138 million crowns a year earlier.
Telenor Serbia’s revenues fell to 606 million crowns through March 2010 from 720 million a year earlier, the Norwegian telecoms group said in its quarterly report.
First-quarter EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) slid to 230 million crowns from 310 million crowns in the first three months to March 2009.
“The number of subscriptions increased by 46,000 during the quarter, while the subscription market share remained at 34%,” the company said, adding that revenues in the local currency, the dinar, decreased by 2.0% due to lower retail and inbound roaming revenues.
Telenor Serbia (www.telenor.rs) had 2.889 million subscribers at end-March 2010, up from 2.863 million a year earlier.
"EBITDA in local currency decreased by 14% mainly driven by increased handset subsidies, partly offset by decreased cost of traffic from roaming."
Investments in the quarter were mainly related to network roll-out and the fixed-line licence acquired on February 19, 2010 for around 9.0 million crowns, the company said.
Serbia has issued Telenor a permit to operate the country's second landline system alongside incumbent telco Telekom Srbija.
Telenor competes on the Serbian market of some 7.5 million people with Telekom Srbija's wireless unit, MTS, and VIP mobile, a unit of Telekom Austria.
Telenor is present in 13 countries. In southeast Europe, it also operates in Montenegro.
(1 euro=7.7856 Norwegian crowns)
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