Telefonica today said its Capex (capital spending) rose 27.2 percent in organic terms and declined 9.8 percent (in reported) in the first six months to €3,523 million.
The telecom operator said its Capital expenditure was focused on technological transformation and network modernization, with over 71 percent of total investment devoted to business transformation and growth.
Telefonica Capex included €189 million relating to spectrum acquisition, primarily in Colombia and Central America against €834 million in the first half of 2013, mainly in the UK, Spain, Brazil and Uruguay.
The mobile service provider said fiber deployment added 1300 premises against 848000 in the first quarter. Telefonica fiber coverage stood at 7.4 million premises (5 million households), almost double the figure in June 2013.
Cesar Alierta, executive chairman of Telefonica, said: “We continued to strengthen its position through higher investments which resulted in 10.5 million premises passed with fibre and an expansion of LTE coverage to almost half of the population in our European markets and one third of the population in Latin America.”
Telefonica subscriber base rose 2 percent to 315.8 million.
Revenues dipped 12.6 percent to €24,957 million in January-June 2014, impacted by the exchange rate fluctuations and changes in the consolidation perimeter.
Mobile data revenue rose 9.2 percent in the second quarter of 2014, 8.8 percent in the first quarter of 2014and 7.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2013.
Telefonica mobile data grew 9 percent in the first half of 2014 and already accounted for 40 percent of mobile service revenues, 3 percentage points higher than the same period of 2013.
Non-SMS data revenue increased 23.8 percent in the first half and already accounting for 72 percent of total data revenues (+9 percentage points year-on-year).
Net income dipped 7.5 percent to €1,903 million in the first half, said Telefonica.
