China Telecom reported first-quarter revenues up 15.7 percent from a year earlier to CNY 67.93 billion. Excluding mobile device sales, revenues were up 12.0 percent to CNY 62.3 billion. The operator's EBITDA, before fees for CDMA network leasing, came in at CNY 24.03 billion, up just 0.9 percent, due to higher costs for the strong increase in device sales, including the iPhone 4S. Device revenues were up 80.7 percent from a year earlier, and the operator also reported higher CDMA network costs due to the growth in susbcribers. Net profit fell 6.5 percent to CNY 4.27 billion. The operator added a net 9.36 million new mobile customers in the three months, for a total 135.83 million at end-march. 3G customers rose by 7.26 million to 43.55 million. Voice traffic of 113.54 billion minutes was little changed versus Q4 but up from 106.05 billion a year earlier. ARPU was also stable versus Q4 at CNY 51.7. Fixed lines fell by 0.88 million to 168.71 million, while the fixed broadband base grew by 3.59 million to a total 80.40 million subscribers.
