Kumar Mangalam Birla-led Idea Cellular has reported it’s thrid successive net loss of ₹815 crore for the quarter ended June as Reliance Jio triggered a brutal price price war in the Indian mobile telephony market.
The third largest mobile operator had posted a net profit of ₹220 crore in the year ago period and a loss of ₹325 crore in the immediate proceeding quarter.
Idea’s revenues during the quarter fell 14% to ₹8,166.5 crore.
Idea attributed the steep decline in voice and mobile data realisations to the aggressive tariff led by unlimited voice and data bundle plans. “However, the fall in realisation rate was largely compensated by a substantial volume growth,” it said.
The Aditya Birla Group company’s net debt of ₹53,920 as of June 30 is in process of merging with Vodafone Plc.’s Indian arm to create India’s largest mobile telephony firm.
Idea Cellular shares on BSE closed down 2.11% at ₹92.65 in a flat Mumbai market on Thursday.
