Liberty Telecoms Holdings Inc. plans to break even after exiting corporate rehabilitation a year ahead of schedule.
“The management really wants to have a break even as soon as possible,” Bienvenido Bañas, Liberty Telecoms president and chief executive told reporters after the company’s stockholders’ meeting.
Liberty, the telecom unit of San Miguel Corp. had secured an approval from Makati regional trial court to terminate the rehabilitation proceedings involving the company and its subsidiaries.
It said the rehabilitation for Liberty and units wi-tribe Telecoms Inc. and Skyphone Logistics Inc. had been fully implemented.
The company was supposed to exit from rehabilitation proceedings next year.
“The management of the company is really trying to find new ways to generate new revenue and then find ways to maximize the existing telco assets of the company at the same time implement some cost efficiency with that way we can mitigate probably whatever loss that we have,” Bañas said.
He said the company plans to lease its base station towers to prospective telco operators.
“In fact in one of the towers we have, Globe or Bayantel is occupying our space,” Bañas said.
At present, Liberty Telecoms had 500 base stations in Metro Manila.
The company, a joint venture of San Miguel and Qatar Telecom, reported a total comprehensive loss of P210.16 million in the first quarter of 2015, lower by 31.68 percent than the P307.59-million net loss recorded a year ago.
Revenue declined to P42.17 million in the January to March period from P78.38 million in the same period last year.
“The group’s revenues for the period reflect the decrease in subscribers of postpaid and prepaid Wimax broadband and increase in non-service revenue due to additional rental income from other telecommunication companies,” it said.
Liberty Telecoms had 50,000 subscribers.
Expenses declined to P280.94 million in the three-month period from P323.39 million last year.