Dubai-based Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company PJSC announced that its third-quarter results delivered a 7.9 per cent year-on-year jump in revenues to AED 3.87 billion, underpinned by growth in mobile, fixed and ICT businesses. The company reported an EBITDA of AED 1.85 billion, which equated to a margin of 47.8 per cent, while normalised net profit rose by 25.8 per cent to AED 732 million.
Chief Executive Fahad Al Hassawi said these results reinforced du’s growth trajectory and operational discipline, noting that the completion of a secondary public offering — which lifted the free float to 27.7 per cent — had enhanced liquidity and diversified the investor base, signalling strong confidence in the company’s long-term strategy.
Underpinning the performance was an expansion in du’s mobile subscriber base, continued uptake of fibre broadband and enterprise connectivity, and a shift in revenue mix toward higher-margin ICT and managed-services offerings. Earlier in the year, the company reported first-quarter revenue growth of 7.4 per cent and a net profit rise of 19.8 per cent as margins expanded and subscriber numbers rose across both post-paid and prepaid segments.
By the end of the half-year, du’s second-quarter revenue increased by 8.6 per cent and net profit climbed 25.1 per cent, while EBITDA margin improved by 3.1 percentage points to 46.8 per cent. The company also reaffirmed full-year guidance for revenue growth of 6-8 per cent and an EBITDA margin of 45-47 per cent.
Market analysts say du’s trajectory is being shaped by three broad trends: first, the UAE’s macro-economic resilience and sustained demand for mobile connectivity in the consumer segment; second, acceleration in fixed fibre and home-wireless adoption driven by higher average revenue per user offerings; and third, the telecom operator’s push into ICT infrastructure services — notably through a partnership with Microsoft Corporation to build a hyperscale data-centre and the launch of a sovereign-cloud platform — which positions it beyond traditional connectivity offerings.
The secondary public offering, executed with selling shareholder Mamoura Diversified Global Holding, proposes to offload up to 7.55 per cent of du’s share capital via roughly 342 million shares priced in the range AED 9 to 9.90 each, with 5 per cent of allocation reserved for retail investors and the remainder for qualified institutional buyers. The move is designed to boost free float, broaden the investor base and potentially enable inclusion in key global indexes.
Despite the favourable winds, du faces headwinds in the form of intensifying competitive pressures in the UAE telecom market, rising capital-expenditure demands as it ramps infrastructure for 5G-Advanced and cloud-services growth, and margin risk if value-added growth fails to keep pace with commoditising connectivity services. In the second quarter, capex rose to AED 545 million — a capex intensity of 14.0 per cent — as the company invested aggressively in data-centre build-out and network enhancement.
Al Hassawi flagged that while the connectivity business remains foundational, “diversification of revenue streams is essential to future growth.” He added that operational efficiency and customer-value management will remain priorities as the UAE market matures. The company’s accelerating uptake of higher-ARPU services and expansion into enterprise ICT are viewed as strategic responses to that imperative.