In the first six months, the Broadband provider generated revenues of Euro 862 million (+7% over H1 2014) and EBITDA growth of 10% to Euro 260 million. The customer base expanded 8% year-on-year. The extension of the fibre-optic network is on schedule, having reached by June 5.8 million families in the 65 largest Italian cities.
In the first half of 2015, Fastweb consolidated its position on the Italian broadband market, thanks to its innovative offers and the quality, speed and stability of connections. The delivery of revenue and margin growth within a highly competitive market featuring significant pressure on prices, together with increasing popularity among both household and business customers, indicates that Fastweb’s significant infrastructural investment is meeting the demands of the Italian market.
At June 30, 2015, the Fastweb customer base had reached 2,157,000 - up 8% (+164,000 customers) year-on-year.
Fastweb confirmed its leadership of the ultra-broadband segment (speeds greater than 30 Mbps), with 560,000 customers connected at speeds of up to 100 Mbps by the end of June.
In H1 2015 Fastweb’s total revenues amounted to Euro 862 million, up 7% on Euro 806 million in the previous year.
EBITDA (earnings before interest, depreciation and amortisation) reached Euro 260 million, increasing 10% on Euro 236 million in H1 2014. The EBITDA margin was 30% (29% in H1 2014).
Investments totalled Euro 279 million - 32% of company revenues and an unprecedented figure in the European telecommunications sector and highlighting Fastweb’s key role in delivering innovation and digitalisation to Italy.
This major investment commitment ensures the continued roll-out of the ultra-broadband network at speeds of up to 100 Mbps, reaching by the end of June 5.8 million families in the 65 largest Italian cities, with 7.5 million homes and 30% of the Italian population to be connected by 2016. Alongside this initiative, Fastweb has taken on a second major project to extend access to the ultra-broadband network and to further the country’s digitalisation: with the WOW FI plan, Fastweb customers in 14 Italian cities can now access free of charge the innovative Wi-Fi broadband community service.
In 2015, in addition to rolling out the ultra-broadband network, Fastweb invested in the creation of the most advanced Datacenter in Italy, which opened in the second quarter and is dedicated to cloud services and large customer security. This investment develops Fastweb’s offer and positioning in the growing cloud services market, strengthening its position as the second largest Italian business telecommunication services provider, with total market share of 25%.
Fastweb signed an agreement during the period with Alcatel and Huawei to further develop the network with technologies such as Vectoring, VDSL Enhanced and Gfast - enabling the provision of speeds of up to 500 Mbps from 2016. In April, testing started with Telecom Italia for the joint provision of VDSL Enhanced technologies.