OTHER SERVICES
POSTEMOBILE
In 2014 PosteMobile continued to focus its efforts on maintaining and strengthening its “value” proposition,
developing initiatives designed to acquire higher value customers, thereby consolidating the quality of acquisitions
and increasing the customer base. As a result, the number of lines reached 3.3 million at the end of December 2014
(2.8 million lines at the end of 2013).
A total of 523,000 lines were terminated during the year, down 22% on the 672,000 terminated in 2013.
Voice service minutes exceeded 4.6 billion (up 11% on the 4.1 billion registered in 2013).
The ARPU (Average Revenue Per Unit) for telephone, text and data services stands at €5.7 per customer, per month,
down on the €7.0 per customer, per month in 2013. This primarily reflects changes to regulated charges, and the
evolution of the traditional services mix in favour of value added services.
The company focused its efforts during the period on the innovation of its commercial offering, adding a number of
new initiatives, and further developing the company’s role in the mobile payment services market. In 2014,
PosteMobile also switched to a Full Mobile Virtual Network Operator (Full MVNO) operating model, only relying on
the traditional operator network to connect to the infrastructure, whilst managing the services it provides and issuing
its own SIM cards. This development enables PosteMobile to have greater autonomy and more control of the quality
of the services it provides to its customers.
In the consumer market, PosteMobile continued the gradual transformation of the customer base aimed at increasing
the number of fixed price plans. This entailed continuing to focus on competitively priced fixed price plans, via a
flexible, customisable offering that aims to meet all customer requirements: voice and text only for customers with
simple needs and bundled data options for more sophisticated customers.
On the distinctive services front, the role of PosteMobile was further strengthened via dissemination of the
PosteMobile app. This led to significant growth in the volume of transactions, which reached a total of 1.3 billion
since the launch of the services, enabling the company to position itself as leader in the mobile technology payment
services market. The value of financial transactions carried out by customers in 2014 amounts to €339 million (€290
million in 2013).
PosteMobile also strengthened its position in the areas of proximity services, launching the sale of the SuperSIM NFC,
which enables the use of payment, transport and loyalty card proximity services, including:
- NFC contactless payments at retail outlets with NFC POS, simply by using a smartphone;
- NFC authentication of digital tickets via a partnership with the Milan and Turin municipal public transport companies;
- the digitisation of loyalty cards and luncheon vouchers to enable their use in retail outlets and participation in points collection and promotional campaigns.
As already mentioned in the section on “Distribution channels”, the number of PosteMobile corners inside post offices has increased (319 corners in operation at the end of December 2014).
Growth of the customer base and a good performance by the flat-rate offering (thanks to gradual repositioning of
the portfolio in this segment) mitigated the effects of the reduction in voice revenues which, in the first half of the
year, were affected by the reduction in termination charges from July 2013 (bringing down the rate charged from
1.5 to 0.98 cents per minute). Therefore, revenues from sales and services, amounting to €321.5 million in 2014,
marks a slight increase on the €321.1 million recorded in 2013.
Despite a reduction in the cost of goods and services, which amount to €233.9 million (€247.0 million in 2013),
operating profit reflects higher depreciation and amortisation, primarily due to the Full MVNO platform (up €12.6
million in 2014), and provisions (up €3.5 million). As a result, operating profit is €13.7 million (€25.4 million in 2013).
The company reports a profit for the year of €7.8 million (€15.8 million for 2013).
With regard to the transaction entered into with the Brazilian postal operator, with the aim of launching a virtual mobile operator in Brazil, on 27 November 2014, Poste Italiane SpA’s Board of Directors decided to put the two special purpose entities into liquidation: Poste Holding Participacoes Do Brasil Ltda (76% owned by Poste Italiane SpA and 24% by PosteMobile SpA) and Italo-Brasil Holding SA (wholly owned by Poste Holding Participacoes Do Brasil).