Globe Telecom said mobile data revenues soared 62 percent in the first quarter, amid continuing demand for data services and popularity of data-driven products and applications.
The Ayala-led telco said mobile data revenues hit P9.1 billion in the January-March period, up from P5.6 billion reported in the same period last year.
The company said total data revenues, when lumped with home broadband and corporate data revenues of P3.5 billion and P2.3 billion, now represented 50 percent of total service revenues, up from 36 percent last year.
Globe said mobile data revenues also accounted for 40 percent of total mobile service revenues in the first quarter, up from its 26-percent contribution in the first quarter of 2015.
Globe president and chief executive Ernest Cu said mobile data growth drew support from market-relevant data offers, availability of low-priced data capable devices and a strong and reliable data network.
“We believe that the Globe brand is extremely strong in its positioning as the smartphone network of choice and the data growth is reflective of that. As the strategy is to continue to be aggressive in the market, we continue to make investments to enhance our wireless network so we have more capacity on the ground. We expect to see mobile data business to continue growing,” said Cu.
A steady growth in the company’s mobile customers, reaching 57.3 million at the end of the first quarter from 48.4 million a year ago, also provided support for mobile data, Cu said.
The company’s mobile revenues totaled P23.1 billion in the first quarter, up 7 percent from P21.6 billion a year earlier.
This supported consolidated revenues to reach P29.9 billion, or 14 percent higher than P26.2 billion a year earlier. Net profit rose 3 percent to P4.3 billion from P4.2 billion.
Globe said following a successful network modernization program that saw mobile data exploding in the Philippines, it embarked on another nationwide infrastructure program to enhance the country’s Internet experience involving capacity expansion for mobile network using different technologies including 3G, LTE and even Wi-Fi.
Mobile data explosion in the country, amid steady growth in smartphone penetration, requires more bandwidth than traditional voice and text messaging services.