China Mobile said it added 13.88 million new customers during the first quarter of the year, pushing its world-leading customer base to more than 781 million connections. The carrier’s growth was on the back of next-generation services as its 3G network scored 33.35 million net additions for the quarter and its recently launched LTE-powered service had managed to add 2.79 million since it launched late last year.
However, overall growth was down year-over-year as the carrier posted 16 million net customer additions during the first quarter of 2013. However, 3G customer growth increased significantly from the 26.44 million subscribers it added during the first three months of last year.
Total voice usage increased slightly year-over-year, though usage per customers dipped from 476.15 minutes per month during the first quarter of 2013 to 445.28 minutes per month this year. Text messaging also witnessed a decline in usage, falling from 88 text messages per month during the first quarter of 2013, to 65 text messages per month this year.
China Mobile attributed the drop in voice calling and messaging to an increased use of over-the-top services across its network.
China Mobile did see an increase in data usage, with cellular data surging from an average of 47.45 megabytes used per month during the first quarter of 2013 to 81.13 Mb used this year, while data usage across China Mobile’s Wi-Fi network increased from 128.13 Mb in 2013 to 160.77 Mb this year.
Despite the slower overall customer growth, China Mobile managed to increase first-quarter revenues from $23 billion in 2013 to $24.8 billion in 2014, a figure no doubt helped by a customer base that had added nearly 54 million subscribers over the past year. However, total profits dipped from $4.469 billion last year to just over $4 billion during the first quarter of this year.
The carrier attributed the dip in earnings to an increased focus on building out its 3G and LTE network.
“Against the background of accelerating strategic transformation and capacity enhancement, the group faced continuously increasing pressure in infrastructure resources allocation and cost control,” the carrier noted in a statement. “The group will continuously uphold the principles of forward-looking planning, effective resource allocation, rational investment and refined management in cost allocation, endeavor to achieve a low-cost, highly efficient operation, consistently reinforce and enhance its core competitiveness, strike a proper balance between the group’s short-term performance and long-term development and maintain favorable capabilities to create value.”
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