GP CEO announces Q1 results, talks about new brand campaign

GP CEO announces Q1 results, talks about new brand campaign
Grameenphone CEO Anders Jensen today announced the company’s first quarter (Q1) results of the current year, showing a healthy growth both in terms of number of subscribers and revenue.
Addressing a press conference on the occasion, he also talked about the recent brand repositioning campaign launched by Grameenphone with the brand promise “Stay Close”.
“Grameenphone is the most well-known local brand and we are reinforcing our strong local roots through this campaign,” he explained. “Grameenphone will continue to help its valued customers to stay close to their loved ones and important things by providing the best voice and data services in a reliable and caring way.”
The press conference was also attended by Chief Financial Officer Arif Al Islam and Public Relations Director Syed Yamin Bakht.
During the first quarter (Jan-Mar’08) of this year, the subscriber-base grew from 16.5 million at the end of last year to 17.8 million. The subscriber-base currently stands at over 18 million. The total revenue grew from BDT 14.3 billion to BDT 14.9 billion during the same period. The annual revenue last year stood at BDT 54.4 billion.
Along with fresh investments of BDT 5.6 billion during the first quarter, the cumulative investments now stand at BDT 117.4 billion including the largest single-year capital expenditure of BDT 35.8 billion last year. ¬¬This has enabled Grameenphone to build the largest network with the widest coverage around the country, bringing more than 98 percent of the population under its network coverage. The Grameenphone network now has more than 10600 Base Stations in over 6100 locations around the country.

The total shareholders’ dividend so far stands at BDT 9.1 billion including taxes and a declared dividend of BDT 1.5 billion in 2007, which is less than 8 percent of the total investment.
Grameenphone has so far contributed more than BDT 111.2 billion to the National Exchequer in direct and indirect taxes up to Q1’08. The total contribution was BDT 34.2 billion in 2007, up from BDT 20.5 billion during the previous year.

Going back to the brand campaign, the Grameenphone CEO noted that the company is committed to making its services affordable to a much larger segment of the population, both in urban and rural areas, while maintaining the premium quality which has always been its brand image.

“We are committed to provide the best network, innovative products and services useful to the customers and quality customer interactions at every touch-point,” he added.