Vodafone reels under GST, Jio effect, reports 39 per cent plunge in H1 profit

Mumbai: Following its peers, the second largest telco Vodafone India on Tuesday reported a steep 39.2 per cent plunge in pre-tax profit at Rs 4,075 crore for the six months to September as its revenue fell 15.8 per cent to Rs 19,002 crore due to the fierce completion since the entry of Reliance Jio.

The company, which is on course to merge with the third largest player Idea had Rs 22,579 crore in revenues, and an operational profit of Rs 6,704 crore a year ago, which is down 39.2 per cent.

Vodafone attributed the poor set of numbers to the continuing price competition from Jio and incumbents, seasonality and higher GST rate.

Service revenue fell 15.8 per cent to Rs 19,002 crore in H1 while Ebidta plunged 39.2 per cent to Rs 4,075 crore from Rs 6,704 crore, it said in a statement.

This is despite the fact that the company had strong performance on cost delivering an Ebitda margin of 21.4 per cent as "data usage quadrupled during the period" and had an operating free cash flow of Rs 1,543 crore.

The company also increased its revenue market share (RMS) by 60 bps to 23.1 per cent during the reporting period as its customer base rose 3.3 per cent to 207 million.