Vodafone Ireland today reported operating profits of €328m for the year ending March 31, 2004, up 16% on the previous year. Turnover was over €2.1 billion, a 12% increase, due to increased voice and data usage.
The company's Average Revenue Per User grew from €553 to €582 last year, as a result of strong growth in data revenues. That is about €1.60 a day.
This figure represented 20.5% of service revenues for the year ended March 2004 , up from 19.1% the previous year.
Vodafone said that Ireland continues to have the highest levels of outgoing voice usage per customer in the Group's mobile businesses, and the highest data usage in the Group's European mobile businesses.
Vodafone Ireland said it had 1,864,000 customers at the end of the fiscal year - a market share of 54%.
Vodafone Ireland's parent, Vodafone reported a 19% increase in headline pre-tax profits to £10 billion sterling for the year to March. Group revenue rose by 10% to £33.6 billion, the UK mobile phone company said.
The company added 13.7 million new mobile customers in the year, bringing its global total to 133.4 million.
'These results reflect a strong operational performance with an excellent level of free cash flow generation,' said chief executive Arun Sarin.
Vodafone said it would buy back a further £3 billion worth of its own shares in the next year and raised its dividend by 20%.
Despite a strong operating performance, however, Vodafone made a net loss of £9 billion, down 8% from the previous year, owing to significant goodwill amortisation related to past takeovers.
