Orange CEO Stephane Richard (pictured) insisted the operator remained resilient in the second quarter, despite negative effects of the Covid-19 (coronavirus) health crisis.
Revenue was flat at €10.4 billion (0.4 per cent down year-on-year) on declines in roaming and equipment sales. The company did not provide a net income figure for the quarter.
Despite the overall stagnation, Orange’s domestic revenue grew 2.7 per cent to €4.6 billion, supported by growth of wholesale and retail services.
In Africa and the Middle East, there was also an uptick of 1.3 per cent to €1.4 billion, driven by data revenue from 4G.
This offset continued struggles in Spain, where revenue dipped 6.8 per cent to €1.2 billion as the market “slides towards low cost”, while the operator also faced woes in the rest of its Europe division, with sales down 3.6 per cent to €1.3 billion.
In terms of customers, the company pointed to continued momentum with its convergent strategy, which reached 10.8 million, up 2.1 per cent.
As noted, 4G in Africa and the Middle East gained traction, with customers up 40.4 per cent to 27.9 million. Orange Money had 19.6 million active customers, 18.9 per cent higher.
Richard said the company’s second quarter results bore witness to its resilience and capacity for “collective mobilisation” in the face of the health crisis.
Orange maintained it did not foresee any significant deviation with respect to its financial outlook for the rest of the year.
However, it was unable to confirm if it would return to a dividend distribution of €0.70 per share, after cutting the payment [1] by 30 per cent in April.
[1] https://www.mobileworldlive.com/featured-content/top-three/orange-maintains-2020-outlook-despite-dividend-cut/
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