Telefonica Predicts Return to Growth

Telefonica expects its revenues to grow between 1% and 4% in 2010, while it plans to spend between 7.45 billion and 7.65 billion euros on capex, up from 7.26 billion euros in 2009. Although it cut capex spending by 11% last year, Telefonica said "3G coverage increased by 15 percentage points, fixed loops able to support bandwidth above 25 Mbps grew by 6 percentage points, whereas the capacity of the IP network doubled," compared with 2008.

Telefonica also said that its revenues in 2009 rose 0.2% on a like-for-like basis to 56.73 billion euros. It added that Telefónica Latinoamérica "contributed 2.7 percentage points to organic growth and.... Telefónica Europa contributed 0.2 percentage points." It also pointed to an improved revenue performance from Telefónica España in the second half of the year, with a slowdown in the pace of year-on-year revenue decline in the fourth quarter. source: Telefonica statement

Deutsche Telekom's Sales Slide

Stripping out the impact of the acquisition of OTE and currency movements, Deutsche Telekom's revenues declined 2.2 billion euros (almost 4%) in 2009, as the group grappled with the economic slowdown, new regulatory measures and intense competition. Total revenues in 2009 (including OTE's contribution) were 64.6 billion euros.  In the fourth quarter, DT's revenues fell almost 3% year-on-year in Germany, more than 5% in the US (in US dollars) and 10% in the UK (in British pounds), where it is preparing to enter into a joint venture with Orange UK.

In 2010, Deutsche Telekom plans to increase capital expenditure slightly to about 9.1 billion euros, excluding any investments in spectrum, with a significant increase planned in Germany, where it hopes to safeguard its competitiveness and future viability. DT also said it doesn't expect to do any major M&A deals in 2010. source: Deutsche Telekom report

Regulation Erodes France Telecom

France Telecom said that its "underlying" revenues in 2010 should be flat compared with 2009, but it expected the impact of regulation to reduce sales by almost 1 billion euros in the year. In 2009, revenues fell 2% on a like-for-like basis to just under 51 billion euros. As it ramps up its fibre-to-the-home programme in France, France Telecom expects capital spending to be around 12% of revenues in 2010 compared with just over 11% in 2009.

Dragged down by the impact of regulation, France Telecom said that its revenues fell 3% year-on-year to 12.8 billion euros on a like-for-like basis in the fourth quarter of 2009. Group capital spending in 2009 fell 15% to 5.66 billion euros as France Telecom cut investment in 2G mobile networks. source: France Telecom presentation

Symbian's Share Slips

Nokia's Ovi Gathers Momentum

Nokia said that there are now one million downloads a day from its Ovi apps store and the number of people shopping at the store is doubling every month. Ovi Maps is being downloaded 100,000 times a day, according to the handset vendor, while a million people each month open an Ovi Mail account.

Nokia said it has now signed up more than 70 mobile operators to provide its push email service, Nokia Messaging, while 60 operators in 18 countries provide billing services for its Ovi store. source: Nokia statement

Turkcell's Mobile Marketing Sales to Surge

Turkcell generated 100 million US dollars in revenue from mobile advertising and marketing in 2009 and expects 60% growth in 2010, a company executive said Wednesday at a Mobile World Congress' panel, according to Dow Jones Newswires. "Around one third of the 100 million dollars was generated from mobile advertising," said Melis Tuerkmen, who heads the company's mobile marketing and advertising division, while the remainder was generated from mobile marketing, according to the report. source: Total Telecom./Dow Jones Newswires

Alcatel-Lucent Hit By China Slowdown

Alcatel-Lucent said that its revenues in the fourth quarter of 2009 were lower than it expected because of a significant slow-down in 3G roll-out in China, a sequential decline in North America after a strong third quarter and some "supply-chain issues". The Paris-based firm forecast that the telecommunications equipment and related services market should grow at a nominal rate (between 0% and 5%) in 2010. source: Alcatel-Lucent presentation

TeliaSonera Expects to Expand

TeliaSonera said it expects its organic sales to be "somewhat higher" in 2010 than the 109.16 billion Swedish krona (14.98 billion US dollars) it generated in 2009. The Stockholm-based telecoms company said that its capital expenditures "will be driven by continued investments in broadband and mobile capacity as well as in network expansion in Eurasia," adding that it expects its capex-to-sales ratio to be "somewhat below 15%" in 2010, compared with 12.8% in 2009.

In the fourth quarter of 2009, TeliaSonera's organic sales fell less than 1% year-on-year to 27.41 billion krona. source: TeliaSonera statement

Sprint-Nextel Sales Down 7%

Sprint Nextel said that its consolidated net operating revenues fell 7% year-on-year in the fourth quarter of 2009 to 7.9 billion US dollars primarily because of a "lower contribution from post-paid wireless service revenues as well as wireline revenues, partially offset by an increase in prepaid wireless service and equipment revenues."

The U.S. operator's capital expenditure in the quarter was 554 million dollars, compared to 548 million dollars in the fourth quarter of 2008.  Sprint Nextel expects that "both post-paid and total subscriber losses will improve in 2010 compared with 2009". It also said that full-year capital expenditure in 2010 will be up to $2 billion compared with 1.6 billion dollars in 2009. source: Sprint Nextel statement

Telenor Predicts Uplift in 2010

Predicting a revenue rebound in south east Asia, Telenor forecast that its organic revenues will grow by a low single digit percentage in 2010 after falling 1% in 2009. The Oslo-based telecoms company, which has operations in Europe and Asia, also expects capital spending to fall to between 14% and 16% of revenues in 2010 compared with 16.5% in 2009.

In the fourth quarter of 2009, Telenor's organic revenues fell 1% year-on-year to 26.26 billion Norwegian (4.44 billion US dollars) as the operator continued to grapple with "challenging" conditions in central and eastern Europe. source: Telenor presentation

Cisco Sees Strong Growth Ahead

In the quarter ending January 23, 2010, Cisco said its net sales rose 8% to 9.8 billion US dollars thanks to particularly strong growth in its switches business. Cisco said that it is seeing a strong recovery in capital spending among its customers and expects its revenues to increase between 23% and 26% year-on-year in the current quarter.

John Chambers, Cisco's CEO, said: "We would expect, with all the appropriate caveats about the continued economic recovery, to add between 2,000 to 3,000 people to Cisco in the next several quarters." source: Cisco prepared remarks.

Mobile Data Shores Up Vodafone

Vodafone said that the year-on-year, organic decline in its group service revenue slowed to 1.2% in the quarter ending December 31, 2009 from 3% in the previous quarter. Group revenues, which were 11.5 billion British pounds (18.14 US dollars) in the quarter, were shored up by a 18% year-on-year increase in mobile data revenues to more than 1 billion British pounds, thanks to an increase in usage of smartphones in Europe, compensating for declining voice revenues.

The U.K.-based operator also said that its organic service  revenues grew 14% year-on-year in India and 13% in Turkey. Vodafone said that fixed line revenue grew by 10% to 862 million pounds. source: Vodafone statement

Double Digit Growth for América Móvil

América Móvil said that its revenues rose 13% year-on-year to 107 billion Mexican pesos (8.25 billion US dollars) in the fourth quarter of 2009, as mobile data revenues climbed almost 49% and subscribers rose 10% to 201 million.

Across 2009, the pan Latin America mobile operator registered a 17% increase in revenues to 395 billion pesos. source: América Móvil statement

South Africa Fuels Vodacom Growth

Vodacom said its group revenue in the quarter ending 31 December 2009 increased by 6% year-on-year to 15.43 billion South African rand (2.07 billion US dollars) "with continued robust performance in South Africa offsetting revenue declines in Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo". source: Vodacom statement

iPhone Lifts SoftBank

SoftBank said its sales rose almost 7% year-on-year in the quarter ending December 31, 2009 to 686 billion yen (7.59 billion US dollars) boosted by an increase in its mobile subscribers and its customers' increased use of mobile data services. SoftBank said that the iPhone, which it sells exclusively in Japan, was the best selling handset on the market in 2009.  source: SoftBank statement

Reliance's Revenues Tumble

Reliance Communications, one of India's largest telecoms groups, said that its revenue in the quarter ending December 31, 2009 was 53.1 billion Indian rupees (1.15 billion US dollars), down 9% from 58.5 billion rupees in the same quarter of 2008, even though its total subscribers rose to 93.8 million at the end of 2009 compared with 61.3 million at the end of 2008. Amid intense price competition in the Indian market, Reliance said its wireless ARPU in the quarter was 149 rupees a month, down from 251 a year earlier, while wireless revenues per minute fell to 0.45 rupees (less than 1 US cent) from 0.61 in the same quarter of 2008. source: Reliance statement