Jio Platforms, the holding company for Reliance Industries’ digital services business, reported a net profit of ₹5,693 crore in Q1 of FY25, up 11.7 per cent on year. Revenue rose 12.8 per cent to ₹34,548 crore on subscriber additions in both the mobility business and homes.
Sequentially, the net profit and revenue were up 2 per cent in the year.
EBITDA in the quarter rose 11.6 per cent on year to ₹14,638 crore but was up 1.9 per cent sequentially. The EBITDA margin at 49.7 per cent was flat sequentially and was down 50 bps on year. This was due to a 1.8 per cent rise in expenses to ₹19,266 crore, the bulk of which was due to network expenses at ₹7,923 crore. The company also spent ₹2,433 crore on license fees and spectrum charges. Sales and distribution expenses rose over 14 per cent sequentially to Rs 804 crore, as the company has been spending heavily on advertisement and marketing. Finance costs rose nearly 10 per cent to Rs 1101 crore.
The monthly average revenue per user for network provider Reliance Jio Infocomm was stable at ₹1,81.7 sequentially and there was a marginal uptick from year ago. The company said though there was a better subscriber mix, it was offset by increasing mix of promotional unlimited 5G data being offered at no separate charge.
The network operator’s data traffic rose by a third in the quarter, while daily per capita data consumption was more than 1GB.
The customer base of the company saw an annual rise of 9.2 per cent to 489.7 million adding about 8 million users in the quarter.
Commenting on the tariff hikes that the company and other players took towards the end of the quarter, officials said that while there may be some temporary effect on demand, it will even out in the long run.
The tariff hike, an increase of 13-25 per cent, would impact the financials in the current quarter.
The company had participated in the spectrum auction in June and the company said it had acquired additional spectrum in 1800 MHz band in Bihar and West Bengal for ₹974 crore.