Bharti Infratel Q2 results: Net profit falls 24% YoY

New Delhi: Bharti group's tower arm Bharti Infratel reported a net profit of Rs 733 crore for the second quarter this fiscal, marginally up 4% on-quarter but down 24% on-year basis, hurt by high net finance cost.

Infratel chairman Akhil Gupta on Thursday also announced the closure of the company's long-standing merger deal with Indus Towers.

“In a major development relating to merger of Indus and Infratel, National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has given its approval to the aforesaid merger, which has been in process for a long time. The filing with Registrar of Companies (ROC) post final closing based on agreed closing adjustments is likely to be done within 30 days,” Gupta said in a statement.

Bharti Infratel has 68.6% stake in Indus Towers, the world’s biggest telecom tower company with 169,000 towers, while UK’s Vodafone Group has 28.2% equity stake.

On the results, Gupta said that with a strong balance sheet, the company is well poised to be the beneficiary of data-led growth in the sector.

“During the quarter, we have witnessed the highest net tower additions in the last eight years and the highest net co-location additions in the last three years,” he said.

Co-locations are points where a tower company deploys mobile telecom antennae of multiple carriers on a single structure.

India’s sole listed tower company, Infratel, added 1,482 towers and 2,116 co-locations in the July-September period, leading to a sequential rise of 2.4% in sharing revenue per tower per month.

Its consolidated revenue stood at Rs 3,695 crore, having risen 2% on-year but declined 5.4% on-quarter. Consolidated earning before interest, tax, depreciation & amortization (EBITDA) was Rs 1,836 crore, down 3% on-year but climbed 1.6% on-quarter.

Net finance costs were higher by 24% on-year at Rs 155 crore for the quarter.

The company’s stock rose 1.84% to Rs 196.05 per share on BSE on Monday. Results were declared after market hours.