PLDT Inc. said Thursday net income jumped 39 percent in the first quarter on higher revenues from home and enterprise businesses.
The country’s largest telecom company said net income reached P6.9 billion in January to March, up from P4.9 billion in the same period last year.
“We are building on the gains of 2017, leveraging on the strength of our home and enterprise businesses, which achieved record high revenues in the first quarter this year. Both now account for nearly half of our total service revenues,” PLDT chairman and chief executive Manuel Pangilinan said.
“At the same time, we are stabilizing and raising the trajectory of our wireless individual business which registered two sequential quarters of top line growth,” he said.
Consolidated core income reached P6.1 billion in the three-month period, up 14 percent from a year ago.
Core income, excluding that of unit Voyager, rose 23 percent year-on-year to P6.7 billion, which if annualized would put the company ahead of its income guidance of P23 billion to 24 billion for 2018.
PLDT’s consolidated service revenues amounted to P36.7 billion, up 3 percent year-on-year.
PLDT Home reported revenues of P8.9 billion in the first quarter, up 14 percent year-on-year, driven by robust subscriber takeup of home broadband services, while the enterprise group posting revenues of P9.2 billion, up 7 percent.
The wireless individual business of Smart, TNT and Sun contributed P14.8 billion in service revenues in the first quarter, up by 2 percent year-on-year.
“Given these developments, we maintain our guidance that full-year recurring core income for 2018 excluding Voyager will reach P23-24 billion and that our capex will increase to P58 billion this year,” Pangilinan said.
“The different factors for recovery are coming together. Our network transformation has made much headway and our customers are feeling the difference. PLDT and Smart are coming together like never before to develop and deliver data and digital services that delight customers and help them improve their lives. These are the key success factors,” he said.