WIRELESS services provider Globe Telecom Inc. expects to end the year on a positive note, banking on its expanding mobile-data business to grow its bottom line in 2015.
Globe Senior Vice President for Consumer Mobile Marketing Issa Cabreira said her company’s partnerships with global content providers, most have been forged last year, will drive the company’s mobile-data business further upward.
“Globe has shown great success in partnering with key global players, such as Google, Viber, Facebook and recently, Spotify and the NBA, as we continue to boost our mobile-data business and provide our customers the best content offers and experiences,” she said.
The partnerships with international service and content providers yielded an 18-percent growth in mobile-data revenues to P10.2 billion as of end-September, 46 percent higher compared to the combined mobile-data revenues of its two competitors.
The growth was a result of the trend shift from unlimited plans to consumable data plans.
The consistent growth in mobile-data revenues was also spurred by the continuing popularity of data-driven products and applications, increasing demand for data connectivity, as well as the growing affordability and availability of data-enabled smartphone devices.
The second-largest telecommunications company in the Philippines has earmarked P29 billion for its annual budget for 2015. The bulk of the amount will be invested in further modernizing its infrastructure to boost its capacity to handle larger volumes of bandwidth.
The telco arm of conglomerate Ayala Corp. is “keen on pursuing more partnerships with both local and international brands to bring topnotch content across all devices anytime, anywhere.”
Recently, Globe ventured into the realm of entertainment with another exclusive partnership with local movie-production giant Viva Communications to enable access to thousands of movies, clips, music videos, and live concerts and events on mobile via Piso Mall.
“This year we are excited to up the ante as we provide our customers more variety content from new partners to further enrich the digital entertainment lifestyle,” Cabreira said.
In the first nine months of 2014, the company booked a net income of P10.53 billion fueled by an increase in service revenues, which is at P72.7 billion, despite a faster rise in expenses to P42.9 billion.
It also posted double-digit growth in both revenues and customer base last year. And as of end-September, broadband service revenues climbed to P9.0 billion, up by 16 percent, from P7.8 billion last year.
The broadband customer base hit over 2.5 million, a 36-percent growth from 1.9 million in 2013.