Thai satellite provider Thaicom yesterday revealed it swung to a profit of 174 million baht ($5.83 million) in 2012 – its first annual consolidated net profit in five years.
The operator also reported a standalone profit from its satellite operations of 786 million baht, compared to a 476 million baht loss in 2011.
Total revenue grew 9.7% to 7.26 billion baht, due largely to a 13.8% increase in revenue from its Thaicom-5 satellite.
Revenue from its IPSTAR satellite also grew 7.7%, thanks to the receipt of the first full-year revenues from deals with Japan's Softbank, Measat, and Australia's NBN Co signed in 2011.
“Our satellite operations are improving continually, and more than 86% of our revenues now come from this sector,” Thaicom CEO Suphajee Suthumpun said.
He said that the company has already pre-sold nearly 40% of the capacity of its Thaicom-6 satellite, which is scheduled to launch later this year. The company has also been granted approval to deploy Thaicom-7 in 2014.
Besides its satellite business, Thaicom has a number of telecom subsidiaries throughout Asia. One of these, Mfone, filed for insolvency last month.
Mfone, a subsidiary of Thaicom's 51%-owned holding company subsidiary Shenington Investments, is a Cambodian mobile operator. The company filed for insolvency after a deal for Shenington to sell the company to INT Management Services fell through.
The filing means that Thaicom will no longer be carrying Mfone's losses from this year.