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Swisscom achieves a high half-year profit – the subscription prices for mobile phones are not getting any cheaper.
Author: Denise Joder-Schmutz
Mobile, Internet and television subscriptions – Swisscom’s core business in Switzerland has been under pressure for some time. Sales here fell slightly in the last half year.
Business in Italy was better with the Swisscom subsidiary Fastweb and with IT services for business customers. Swisscom earned more there. The sales of the blue giant remained stable across all business areas.
Swisscom: Good half-year results
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In the first half of the year, Swisscom achieved a net profit of CHF 848 million – with sales of CHF 5.45 billion, which were slightly lower than in the same period of the previous year. While the core business in Switzerland continues to shrink, sales of IT solutions for business customers continue to increase. The Swisscom subsidiary Fastweb in Italy also did well, although the weakness of the euro against the franc reduced profits in Italy somewhat in the first half of the current year. (sda)
Swisscom boss Christoph Aeschlimann was also satisfied. “We continue to have a very strong market position,” he emphasized.
Price war – and inflation
The telecom market is characterized by fierce price wars. With cheap subscriptions and promotions, the providers try to entice customers away from the competition and win them over. In addition, inflation is depressing income.
For this reason, all three major telecom providers in Switzerland – Salt, Sunrise and Swisscom – recently changed their general terms and conditions for mobile phone subscriptions. They can now adjust the subscription prices to inflation once a year – i.e. increase them.
Swisscom is not increasing prices for the time being
For customers, this means that promotions no longer mean permanently low prices. Swisscom has initially promised not to increase mobile subscription prices until the end of 2024. Despite inflation. “We are also affected by higher wage, energy and material costs,” says Aeschlimann. But the increased costs are well under control.
One thing is clear: the cost pressure will not disappear anytime soon and the pressure on Swisscom’s core business will remain high.