Orange maintained growth in the first quarter, saying it's yet to see a major impact on results from the Covid-19 pandemic. The operator grew sales 1.0 percent on a like-for-like basis to EUR 10.4 billion and increased EBITDAal by 0.5 percent on the same basis to EUR 2.6 billion. The company maintained its full-year outlook and said it would provide a further update at its Q2 report after the impact of the crisis is more clear.
Revenue growth in Q1 was led by the Africa and Middle East operations, up 6.2 percent on a comparable basis to EUR 1.4 billion. The French market grew 0.5 percent to EUR 4.4 billion, and the Enterprise segment was up 0.8 percent to EUR 1.9 billion, while Spain declined 2.4 percent to EUR 1.3 billion. The rest of Europe grew revenues 0.3 percent to EUR 1.4 billion.
Equipment sales fell 10 percent year-on-year to EUR 650 million, as around three-quarters of the operator's shops in Europe were shut from mid-March. This was offset by continued growth in convergent packages, with revenues up 4.5 percent to EUR 1.83 billion. Convergent customers increased 3 percent year-on-year to 10.8 million.
Mobile-only service revenues rose 0.4 percent to EUR 2.6 billion, while fixed revenues were down 2.3 percent to EUR 2.33 billion. Orange also returned to growth of 1.9 percent in wholesale revenues, to EUR 1.93 billion, and IT services increased sales 10.3 percent to EUR 779 million.
Orange reduced capex slightly by 3.2 percent to EUR 1.58 billion, as the coronavirus restrictions delayed some projects. This left the company with operating cash flow of EUR 1.0 billion, up 7.4 percent year-on-year.
Capex focused on the fibre roll-out, leading to 41.6 million homes passed with very high-speed broadband at the end of March. The number of high-speed broadband subscribers reached 8.1 million, up 20.7 percent year-on-year. Orange also reached over 98 percent 4G coverage in its main European markets and at least 96 percent elsewhere, and passed the milestone of over 70 million 4G customers in the quarter.
