German operator 1&1 Drillisch said that in the first nine months of 2019, its revenues rose by 1.3 percent to EUR 2.75 billion from EUR 2.71 million in the same period last year. EBITDA declined by 3.1 percent, or EUR 16.1 million, to EUR 508.7 million.
The company had already announced an expected decrease in EBITDA for the current fiscal year, after losing a request to reduce the price for wholesale access to Telefonica's mobile network.
EBITDA would have increased by 6.8 percent excluding EUR 4.7 million for the effects of IFRS 16, one-offs of EUR 3.8 million, the regulatory decision on the increase in subscriber line charges, EUR 2.5 million for the initial costs of its 5G mobile network and in particular EUR 59 million in additional costs for advance service purchases following the expiry of the previous wholesale service contract at the end of 2018. EBIT in the first nine months of 2019 amounted to EUR 391.3 million.
The number of customers grew by 6.5 percent to 14.12 million in the first nine months of the fiscal year. In particular, the number of mobile internet customers increased by 9.5 percent to 9.78 million while broadband lines grew by 0.2 percent to 4.34 million.
For Q3, the company said that revenues increased to EUR 929.7 million from EUR 913.5 million in the second quarter. Service revenues grew from EUR 730.4 million in Q2 to EUR 740.7 million in Q3, while hardware and other revenues fell to EUR 172.8 million.
EBITDA in Q3 declined to EUR 168.3 million compared with the previous quarter, while EBIT increased to EUR 132.3 million. Free cash flow jumped from EUR 66.4 million in Q2 to EUR 137.8 million in Q3.
