Lisbon, April 15, 2025 (Lusa) - Altice Portugal's revenues rose by 0.7% last year, compared to the same period in 2023, to €2.775 billion, and overall investment totalled €422 million, the owner of Meo announced on Tuesday. "Revenues grew by 0.7% in 2024 compared to the same period last year, despite the reduction in Altice Labs' revenues, which came essentially from sales of equipment and hardware," the group led by Ana Figueiredo said in a statement. "Excluding the performance of Altice Labs, revenues continued to grow, increasing by 5.4% compared to the same period last year, revealing the solid performance of core telecommunications services, the diversification of the portfolio, especially in the energy business, as well as the quality and excellence of the services provided," Altice Portugal added. Although revenues grew, earnings before taxes, interest, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) "fell by 1.2% in 2024 compared to the previous year, essentially penalised by the performance of Altice Labs". EBITDA stood at 994 million euros. Excluding the performance of Altice Labs, "EBITDA increased by 3.3%". Investment totalled 422 million euros, a reduction of 13.5% compared to €488 million in 2023. In the fourth quarter alone, revenues totalled €726 million, down 13.5% from €488 million in 2023. According to the company, this reduction is due to Altice Portugal's already anticipated other investments in previous years and large fibre optic footprint while maintaining "strong" investment in the modernisation of the mobile network, namely in 5G, which has a coverage of 95.8%. In the fourth quarter alone, revenues totalled €726 million, up 3.1% on the same period in 2023, "benefiting from increases of 7.7% in the Consumer segment and 7.9% in the Business Services segment (excluding Altice Labs)." According to the group, the total base of RGUs [revenue generating units], fixed and mobile services, rose in the last quarter of 2024 "to 14 million, as did the total number of unique customers in the Consumer segment, which totalled 1.7 million." This reflects "operational resilience, a focus on new opportunities arising from technological advances and digital transformation, and ongoing customer satisfaction." Total fixed services rose by 1.4% year-on-year to 6.1 million and the customer base for the pay-TV and connectivity services grew by 2.3% and 2.8% respectively, both standing at 1.9 million in the fourth quarter of 2024. The post-paid mobile customer base totalled 5.3 million and, "driven by convergence, grew by 0.% (+50 thousand Customers) in the last quarter of 2024 compared to the previous three months. EBITDA totalled 231 million euros in the fourth quarter of 2024, down 5.4% on the same period last year, it added. "If we exclude the performance of Altice Labs, EBITDA decreased by 0.% compared to the same period of the previous year, as a result of the favourable impact on revenues, resulting from the operational dynamics of expanding the customer base and RGU, the growth of the respective ARPU [average revenue per customer] and the diversification of the portfolio, in new non-telco businesses," explains the owner of Meo. In the fourth quarter, investment totalled €129 million, down 12% year-on-year (€147 million in Q4 2023). "Altice Portugal has 6.5 million homes with optical fibre, a population coverage of the 5G network of 95.8% and 99.97% in the 4G network," the company adds. Broken down, revenues in the Consumer segment totalled €381 million in the fourth quarter, an increase of 7.7%, while Service revenues rose by 6.6%. "This performance was based on the expansion of the unique customer base, which grew over the last 12 months, and on the average valuation of each customer, boosted by fibre coverage, convergence and portfolio diversification, such as the combined tariffs: Telco + Energy," it explains. According to ERSE, Meo Energia consistently, since July 2024, has been attracting the largest number of customers in absolute terms in the last quarter of the year. Unique customers in the consumer segment rose by 0.4% in the quarter, "representing +6.1 thousand net additions, totalling 1.7 million customers". Revenues in the Business Services segment rose by 7.9% in the fourth quarter to €344 million, excluding Altice Labs. "Considering the evolution already described of Altice Labs, overall Business Services revenues decreased by 1.5% year-on-year." ALU/ADB // ADB. Lusa