The Supervisory Board of PJSC Ukrtelecom is satisfied with the implementation of the company’s strategic development program adopted in 2014, the communications provider said. “A group of experts of a leading international consulting company has completed the evaluation of the implementation of Ukrtelecom’s strategic development program. Taking into account the impact of a number of macroeconomic and geopolitical factors, they confirmed that at the end of 2017 last year’s targets were achieved: the revenue target by 104%, EBITDA by 16.7%, that for the number of subscribers by 91%,” the company said in a statement.
According to the company, in February 2018, its supervisory board instructed international experts to conduct an independent assessment of its strategic development, comparing the results achieved with the target indicators of the program. At the same time, the communications provider has not disclosed the name of the auditing company.
According to the report, the operator outstripped the updated targets of 21 out of the 24 strategic initiatives, including topped the revenue target – by 4% (by UAH 6.654 billion in 2017), EBITDA by 67% (by UAH 1.854 billion), EBITDA margin by 11 percentage points (by 28.1 percentage points).
At the same time, in 2017, Ukrtelecom fulfilled its target for the total number of subscribers (telephony and broadband) by 91% (6.622 million).
The evaluation of the implementation of Ukrtelecom development strategy was carried out with regard to the impact of significant external factors, in particular the cessation of its activities in the country’s temporarily occupied territories; restrictions related to post-privatization obligations and litigations; debts to the company by state and local budgets (including for subsidized categories of the population); massive malicious damage to infrastructure (including theft of copper cable); regulatory restrictions in landline communication (tariffs falling behind inflation), as well as the impact of macroeconomic factors (including devaluation of the national currency, increase in the minimum wage) and market dynamics in general, the company said
“Despite the number of negative external factors limiting investment in development, the assessment confirmed that we are moving along the path outlined by the long-term development strategy. Ukrtelecom is developing as a national telecom operator and industry leader,” the company’s director, Yuri Kurmaz, was quoted as saying.
According to the consultants, Ukrtelecom’s share in the total revenues of the Ukrainian b2b communications market (Internet access, landline communications and data transmission services) by the end of 2017 was 35% (an 8% increase from 2013).
