On August 8, China Unicom released the 2022 semi-annual performance report of A-share companies. According to the report, in the first half of 2022, China Unicom achieved main business revenue of RMB 161 billion, an increase of 8.3% year-on-year, and the growth rate reached a new high in the same period in recent years. The company’s total profit reached RMB 13.3 billion, and the net profit attributable to the parent company reached RMB 4.8 billion, a year-on-year increase of 18.7%. EBITDA reached RMB 51.3 billion, representing a year-on-year increase of 3.9%, with a steady increase in profitability and remarkable results in improving quality and efficiency. The asset-liability ratio was maintained at a reasonable level of 42.9%, and the financial expenses dropped sharply by 276% year-on-year, and the financial strength and anti-risk ability were continuously enhanced.
The company attaches great importance to shareholder returns. After fully considering the sound business development of the company, and based on the decision of the holding subsidiary Unicom Red Chip Company to continue to distribute the interim dividend, the board of directors proposed to distribute the interim dividend of China Unicom A shares of RMB 0.0663 per share (tax included), which is expected to increase by 35.9% year-on-year. In the future, the company will continue to strive to improve profitability and shareholder returns.
In the first half of 2022, in the face of severe challenges such as the continuous multi-point distribution of the epidemic, the company firmly grasped the general tone of seeking progress while maintaining stability, and under the guidance of the new strategic planning system, actively embraced the broad opportunities for the development of the digital economy, and comprehensively promoted the “one China Unicom, integrated capability aggregation, integrated operation service” capability generation model.
The company unswervingly enhances its core competitiveness and sustainable development capabilities, moderately increases capital expenditures, and has achieved fruitful results in building a boutique network. In the first half of the year, capital expenditure reached RMB 28.4 billion, a year-on-year increase of 98.5%, laying a solid foundation for the company’s development.
Looking forward to the company’s development in the second half of the year, Chairman Liu Liehong said: “China Unicom will fully, accurately and comprehensively implement the new development concept, centering on the construction of ‘network power, digital China, and smart society’, and comprehensively promote the implementation of the ‘1+9+3’ strategic planning system. Effective, strong supply and stable growth, focus on reform to promote development, prevent risks and ensure safety, firmly enhance the company’s core strategic capabilities, and create greater value for shareholders, customers and society.”
Two-wheel drive of market innovation, integrated development of basic business to a new level
The company unswervingly promotes the transformation of basic business from market-driven to market-driven innovation-driven two-wheel drive, and in-depth implementation of the “5G-led Development Action Plan” and the “Broadband and Smart Home Development Action Plan”. In line with the development trend of “5G, Gigabit, and Convergence” in the industry, take the “dual Gigabit” network upgrade as an opportunity, focus on creating a development model of integration and group development, enhance the user experience and stability of large connections, and build a foundation A base for sustainable business growth. The company strengthened the supply of 5G digital and intelligent life and smart home application products, released new products and new services such as 5G new communication, silver age exclusive, vigorously leveraged the differentiated advantages driven by product innovation, and accumulated momentum for the innovation and transformation of basic business. Use the big data model to empower the whole life cycle, accelerate the improvement of data aggregation on platforms such as digital villages, smart communities, and smart campuses, focus on key scenarios and key customer groups, and carry out user maintenance and value enhancement in a targeted manner, and the level of refined operation has been significantly improved.
The development trend of the company’s basic business is stable and improving, and the value management effect continues to show. In the first half of the year, the main mobile business revenue was RMB 84.9 billion, a year-on-year increase of 3.4%. The number of mobile billing users reached 320 million, of which 5G package users had a net increase of 29.99 million to 184.92 million, and the penetration rate of 5G packages reached 184.92 million. 58%, the user structure is further optimized. The ARPU of mobile users was 44.4 yuan, which remained stable compared with the same period last year. Data release achieved remarkable results. The total mobile Internet traffic increased by 13.4%, and the monthly average data traffic of mobile phone users reached approximately 13.3GB. The company’s fixed-line broadband business continued the good momentum of rapid growth last year. In the first half of the year, broadband access revenue was 23 billion yuan, an increase of 4.3% year-on-year, and an increase of 3.6 percentage points from 0.7% in the same period last year. The net increase of broadband access users was 4.4 million, bringing the total to 99.44 million. The number of net additions reached a new high for the same period in the past 10 years. The integration penetration rate reached 73%, and user stickiness and user value increased significantly.
Build a high-quality network and consolidate the cornerstone of high-quality development
China Unicom has always adhered to the fundamental position of the network in the development of the enterprise, moderately increased strategic investment, and achieved fruitful results in the construction of high-quality networks in the first half of the year, laying a solid foundation for the company’s rooted growth. In terms of 5G/4G boutique network construction, continuous outdoor coverage has been achieved in key township and above scenarios, and the 5G intermediate frequency scale and coverage level are comparable to the industry; in terms of gigabit broadband boutique network construction, the network deployment progress is in line with the industry, with 230 million FTTH ports. Nearly 25 million sets of broadband access residences were added in the south, which strongly promoted the rapid growth of broadband user scale and income scale; in the construction of a high-quality computing power network, the overall network architecture plan of “East Digital and Western Computing” was completed, and the low-latency industrial Internet was preliminarily completed. Plane construction, the total scale has reached 329,000, and the computing power of the backbone cloud pool has reached 580,000 core vCPUs; in terms of government and enterprise boutique network construction, the coverage rate of the top 150 urban aggregation areas has reached 98.8%, and the top 150 urban integrated access areas have reached 98.8% coverage. 90.2%, creating a differentiated competitive advantage in the network of government and enterprise customers.
Accelerating the establishment of Unicom’s characteristic capability system, the transformation of science and technology has yielded a lot
Since the beginning of this year, the company has seen a more significant transition of new and old kinetic energy, and its innovative business has maintained rapid growth; its core scientific and technological breakthroughs have achieved outstanding results, and its scientific and technological innovation capabilities have been steadily strengthened. The company is speeding up the transformation from a quantitative type to a quality type of efficiency and efficiency type, laying a solid foundation for the transformation of scientific and technological innovation.
In the first half of 2022, the company’s research and development expenses increased by 113.7% year-on-year, the proportion of scientific and technological innovation personnel reached 26%, and the number of authorized patents reached 780, a year-on-year increase of 27%. At the just past China Unicom Science and Technology Innovation Conference, the company announced the appointment of 16 academicians and 3 industry experts as specially-appointed experts of China Unicom’s new science and technology committee, and plans to further invest RMB 1 billion as the company’s core technology research special budget, which is listed separately. The core technology research incentives of RMB 30 million will promote China Unicom’s scientific and technological innovation to create a new situation.
The company actively promotes the strengthening of strategic cooperation with national ministries, local governments, enterprises and institutions, deepens the breadth and depth of open cooperation, and serves the digital transformation of the economy and society. Collaborate with leading companies in the fields of basic software and hardware, general security, 5G security, IoT security, and industrial Internet security to drive the industrial chain to gather intelligence and system integration to fully meet the security needs of digital government, digital economy, and digital society.
In the first half of the year, the company’s industrial Internet achieved revenue of RMB 36.9 billion, an increase of 31.8% over the same period last year, contributing more than 70% of the company’s new revenue, becoming a veritable “first engine” for performance growth.
Co-construction and sharing continued to deepen, and operational efficiency was steadily improved
The company is committed to building a 5G network with complete coverage, leading experience, leading capabilities and leading performance, and continues to promote co-construction and sharing. On the basis of coordinating the promotion of basic resources and facilities, promote the cooperation and sharing of technological innovation, IDC and other cloud-network integration fields, and continue to promote the co-construction, sharing and co-maintenance of transmission lines, pipeline optical cables, equipment room ceilings, distribution system infrastructure and key business platforms. A total of excellent.
The company continues to open up the cooperation ecology, actively guides the collective efforts, gathers the internal and external resources of the company, and makes every effort to play the “team competition” of enterprise operation. Make full use of the company’s status as an upstream and downstream hub in the industrial chain, attract more partners to join the ecosystem, actively integrate into the wave of digital economic development, and deepen integration and opening up at a higher level.