Bharti Airtel, India's second-biggest telecom operator, on Monday reported a 22.2% increase in quarterly revenue, boosted by 4G subscriber additions and higher data consumption.
Average revenue per user (ARPU )– a key performance indicator in the telecom industry – came in at ₹183 ($2.30) for the quarter, up from ₹146 from a year earlier. ARPU of rivals Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea for the same period was ₹175.7 and ₹128, respectively.
Analysts expected first-quarter ARPU to be boosted by a residual impact of tariff increase done late last year.
The company's consolidated revenue from operations rose to ₹32,805 crore ($4.12 billion) for the quarter ended June 30, from ₹26,854 crore in the same period last year, according to a regulatory filing.
Airtel said mobile data consumption surged by 16.6 per cent from a year ago, with consumption per mobile data customer at 19.5 GB per month.
The company said in November, when it announced tariff hikes, that mobile ARPU needed to be at ₹200 and ultimately at ₹300, for a financially healthy business model.
Consolidated net profit rose to ₹1,607 crore for the quarter ended June 30, from ₹284 crore a year ago.
The company has been raising money to fund its digital ambitions, including developing home broadband, data centres, cloud adoption as it prepares to launch its next-generation 5G services in the country.
Airtel last week won 5G spectrum worth $5.4 billion in the country's $19 billion auction. The government aims to begin the rollout of 5G - which it says can provide data speeds about 10 times faster than 4G - by October this year.