Chunghwa Q3 revenue grows 9.5%

Taiwan's Chunghwa Telecom has reported flat profit for the third quarter, as investment expenses ate into solid revenue gains.

The operator turned a net profit of TW$11.93 billion ($399.6 million) - down 0.2% year-on-year – despite 9.5% higher revenue of TW$55.71 billion.

Domestic fixed-line revenue grew a strong 17.1% to TW$20.5 billion, but ILD revenue fell 6% and total internet revenue stayed largely flat.

Mobile services revenue grew 6.6% to TW$23.76 billion, with mobile VAS revenue up 40.5% to TW$3.92 billion.

CEO Shyue-Ching Lu said the company had made mobile strides during the period. “Smartphones as percentage of total handsets sold continued to grow, reaching 45% for the quarter,” Lu said.

But this came at a cost, with total operating expenses growing 14.9%, in a result blamed largely on higher cost of handsets sold as well as interconnection charges.

Capex for the quarter likewise grew 7.9% to TW$6.66 billion. Of this, 66.5% was used in the fixed communications business, while 13.4% went to mobile.

For the first nine months of the year, revenue grew 8.3% to TW$162.61 billion, but profit increased just 0.3% to TW$37.07 billion.