OREANDA-NEWS. In the first six months of 2016, mobilezone increased its sales by 71 percent to CHF 523 million (2015: CHF 305 million) and achieved an operating profit (EBIT) of CHF 18.3 million (2015: CHF 14.3 million), which corresponds to a growth rate of 27.7 percent. Based on a pro-forma consolidation in the previous year of the company einsAmobile as of January 1, 2015, sales in the first half of 2015 totaled CHF 445 million compared to CHF 523 million in the first six months of the current year. The net profit rose by CHF 1.8 million, or 17.2 percent, to CHF 12.3 million. In the same period in the previous year, the pro-forma profit amounted to CHF 11.2 million.

Earnings per share were increased from CHF 0.33 to CHF 0.38 in the first half of 2016.

Segment Trade with very strong growth in sales and increased profit
The segment Trade includes the activities in all shops throughout Switzerland, in the online business, in the B2B sector and, since April 2015, also the activities of einsAmobile in Germany.

The market environment both in the retail business and in the B2B sector in Switzerland remains very demanding and challenging. In the recent months, it has become clear that the business strategies of mobilezone and Salt differ too widely to continue offering customers attractive Salt products. Therefore, mobilezone focuses on its partners Swisscom, Sunrise, UPC and TalkTalk and no longer offers any Salt products.

A new shop fitting concept with a completely new design was introduced in the mobilezone shops in Oftringen, Solothurn and Wil in the second half of 2015 and, in 2016, four additional locations (Lucerne Railway Station, Bern Waaghaus, Hinwil and Geneva Rue de Carouge) have already been opened or remodeled based on that new shop concept. This new concept will be implemented in four more locations (Spreitenbach, Emmen, Zug and Zurich L?wenstrasse) by the end of the year.

In particular, the online business but also the wholesale business in Germany showed record results in the first six months of 2016, both in terms of sales as well as operating profit. Specifically in Germany in the first half of the year, 90’000 (previous year: 50’000) mobile contracts were concluded online. 

The segment Trade achieved an increase in sales of 82 percent, from CHF 268 million to CHF 489 million. The wholesale portion of this total amounts to CHF 309 million (previous year: CHF 118 million). The previous year’s pro-forma sales amounted to CHF 408 million.

EBIT increased from CHF 9.2 million to CHF 12.9 million, realizing a growth rate of 39.8 percent. This positive development is primarily due to the results in Germany.

Segment Service Providing reports a slight decline in profitability
Sales in the segment Service Providing decreased from CHF 36.8 million to CHF 34.3 million, or a drop of 7.0 percent. EBIT decreased by 12.5 percent to CHF 3.1 million.

TalkTalk’s sales and EBIT are slightly below the previous year’s figures. The share of mobile customers of TalkTalk’s total sales amounts to 33.5 percent (previous year: 19.5 percent). In mobile telephony, the number of customers grew in the past six months by 4’000 to 36’000.

The order volume in the repair business in Switzerland and Austria decreased by 14 percent in the first six months of 2016. Nevertheless, the repair business reports a slight positive operating profit, which is, however, below the previous year’s figure. For the second half of 2016, mobilezone expects a stable order volume and an improved profitability.

Outlook for the second half of 2016

Regarding the full year 2016, mobilezone remains confident. In the second half of the year, mobilezone expects the launch of a new iPhone model. As experience has shown, this will lead to an increase in the number of contracts - provided the good availability of the new models. Additional online activities will support the company on its chosen path. In the last years, results in the second half of the year have always been considerably stronger than those in the first half of the year.