AAPT revenues & costs decline

Stuart Corner
Sunday, 06 November 2005 13:45

IT Industry - Deals

In its Q1 results, Telecom NZ has reported declines in the revenues of its Australian subsidiary AAPT.

Total revenue was down 9.2 percent to $296 million, the consumer business (residential, small business fixed line, mobile and Internet) dropped 11.6 percent to $137 million. However, operating expenses also declined, by 16.1 percent to $104 million.

The business operations comprise AAPT's operations in the business, corporate government and wholesale markets, and TCNZA. Total revenue was $159 million, a decrease of 7.0 percent, and operating expenses reduced 5.8 percent to $114 million.

Telecom NZ said that, compared to the prior year, full service customers increased by 9.7 percent to 381,000 and bundled customers more than doubled to 158,000.


"The decision to move away from selling mobile as a stand alone product impacted on total consumer revenue. However, Internet revenue has increased due to an increase in both dial-up and broadband customers as more customers are buying a bundle of services."

AAPT is now concentrating its focus on the SME and mass market segment with investment in product development, indirect channels, telesales capability and business support systems. In Q1 2005/2006 capital expenditure of $11 million was invested in direct support of these strategic initiatives.

However Telecom NZ CEO, Theresa Gattung, was reported complaining that negotiations of new wholesale contracts with Telstra Wholesale, were proving difficult with Telstra seeking to increase prices.