Dialog Group profits marginally higher owing to start-up issues in TV

Dialog Telekom has reported a post-tax profit (PAT) of Rs. 7.98 billion for the 9-month period to September 2006, slightly up by seven percent from the 2006 corresponding period, the company said.

The performance of the Dialog group including Dialog Broadband Networks (Pvt Ltd and Dialog Television (Pvt) Ltd Group showed a PAT of Rs. 7.30 billion, a drop of three per cent against 2006 due mainly to a negative contribution of Rs. 542 million from the recently operationalised subsidiary Dialog TV which had a dilutive effect on the group.

Dialog Telekom reported robust growth recording a 40 per cent increase in mobile subscribers year-on-year while revenue was up by 24 per cent.

The company said Dialog TV is currently in an aggressive subscriber acquisition phase on the backdrop of the rapid expansion of channel (content) portfolios. September saw the soft launch of the SET Plans scheme designed to provide subscribers with the fexibility to customise their channel menu to suit their personal preference. “The negative contribution from Dialog Broadband Networks (DBN) accrues largely from costs arising from capacity building ahead of demand and revenue realization from recently established CDMA and WiMaX Network infrastructures. The company is moving rapidly towards a reversal of the latter position with the commercial launch of CDMA services in July 2007 and the full commercialization of WiMaX based Wireless Broadband services in the last quarter,” it said.

The CDMA fixed wireless service was commercially launched in July 2007 and by the third-quarter of 2007, the company has acquired about 7,000 CDMA subscribers.