Aitizaz Hassan ISLAMABAD, April 25 (INP-WealthPK): Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) saw its revenue grow by 3.2% year-on-year to Rs35.1 billion in the first quarter of 2022, mainly helped by the expanding consumer segment led by fixed broadband, mobile data, business and microfinance services. PTCL seized the topline growth momentum, further strengthening its market standing as an integrated telecom services provider in Pakistan despite the challenges of increase in Advance Income Tax (AIT) and reduction in Mobile Termination Rates (MTR). The company’s broadband, local area network and wide area network posted a revenue of Rs19.6 billion during the quarter under review, which was 3.5% higher than the first quarter of 2021, mainly driven by growth in broadband and corporate revenue segments. Though the company posted an operating profit of Rs1 billion in the first quarter, it remained under pressure compared to last year mainly due to the increase in operating costs on account of significant hikes in power tariffs. The PTCL’s net profit was Rs1.9 billion for the first quarter, which was 10% higher than the same period of last year. During the past quarters, PTCL mainly focused on enhancing customer experience by providing the fastest and most reliable internet services under its flagship ‘Flash Fiber’ Fiber-To-The-Home (FTTH) brand. Through an aggressive and robust commercial strategy, the company managed to expand its FTTH services in 27 cities with capacity enhancement for 125,000 new lines during the past year. The rapid rollout of FTTH and strong performance in corporate segment ensured PTCL’s topline growth. The company’s fixed broadband business grew by 10.4% year-on-year during the first quarter of 2022. Its Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) segment also showed a 9.3% growth. Within the broadband business, the company's premium FTTH service showed a significant growth of 86.6%. The company achieved the highest-ever fixed broadband sales in the first quarter of this year since 2015. Voice revenue stream has seen a decline due to lower voice traffic and continued switching over of customers to over-the-top services. Business services segment continued its momentum and sustained its market leadership in IP bandwidth, cloud, data centre and other ICT services segments. PTCL’s corporate business grew by 14% during the first quarter compared to the same period of last year. Within the wholesale business segment, carrier revenue grew by 6.6%, but the overall wholesale segment revenue declined as a result of closure of certain international IP-leased circuits. International revenue, helped by the favourable impact of currency devaluation, increased by 13.7% in the quarter over the last year. Ufone posted a year-on-year growth of 1% in topline in the first quarter of 2022 despite challenges of increase in AIT and reduction in MTR. Excluding the impact of these factors, the normalised growth was 5.3% compared to the same period of last year. Significant network modernisation activity and the rollout of new sites have been carried out during the first quarter of 2022. UPower, a flagship customer-centric product of Ufone, which was launched during the first quarter, has received tremendous response from the customers.