Tower Bersama boosts profit by tenancy

Publicly listed tower company PT Tower Bersama Infrastructure (TBIG) ended last year with surging revenues and net profit, driven by a tenancy boost and lower foreign-exchange loss.

The company booked a 22.2 percent revenue increase to Rp 3.3 trillion (US$254.3 million) last year from Rp 2.7 trillion in 2013.

Cellular operator PT Telekomunikasi Selular (Telkomsel), a subsidiary of PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia (Telkom), remained the largest revenue contributor with rental rates worth Rp 1.2 trillion or 36.8 percent of TBIG’s total revenues.

Operators PT Indosat and PT XL Axiata came second and third with contributions standing at 22.2 percent and 14.2 percent, respectively.

TBIG’s surging revenues has compensated for its increasing loan interests, which reached Rp 985.5 billion or a 35.6 percent increase from Rp 726.2 billion year-on-year (yoy), resulting in the firm booking Rp 1.3 trillion in net profit or an 8.3 percent increase from Rp 1.2 trillion yoy.

The bottom line is also backed by a decrease in foreign exchange loss to only Rp 192.2 billion last year from Rp 799.1 billion in 2013.

“Foreign-exchange loss declined because last year’s rupiah depreciation against the US dollar was not as big as that in 2013,” TBIG finance director Helmy Yusman Santoso said on Wednesday.

The firm’s CEO, Hardi Wijaya Liong, said he was upbeat that his firm would continue to grow as it continued executing orders from customers.

“[…] In 2014, we organically added an additional 1,959 telecommunications towers to our existing portfolio,” he said in a statement.

As of end of last year, TBIG had 11,820 telecommunication sites comprising 10,825 telecommunication towers, 941 shelter-only sites and 54 distributed antenna system (DAS) networks.

With total tower tenants hitting 18,081, the company’s tower tenancy ratio hit 1.67.

Hardi said that his firm was financially healthy, leaving it with an ample room to find external sources for funds.

“Our bank lenders and bondholders have been supportive as we continue to profitably grow our business,” he went on.

TBIG’s net senior debt to EBITDA ratio is 3.69 times and its net debt to EBITDA ratio is 4.84 times, according to its financial report.

The firm’s total debt, valuing dollar loans at their hedged exchange rate, was Rp 14.8 trillion and gross senior debt was Rp 11.5 trillion. The firm’s cash balance was Rp 901 billion.

TBIG, which reached a share-swap deal with Mitratel in October last year, has obtained agreement from its shareholders to release 479.6 million new shares or equal to 10 percent of its stake and transfer 53.3 million treasury shares, which is equal to 78.5 percent stake in Mitratel — a subsidiary of Telkom.

“If Telkom chooses the option to allow TBIG to have 100 percent stake in Mitratel, Telkom will have around 13.7 percent stake in TBIG,” Helmy said.

Besides the equity stake in TBIG, Telkom will also receive cash of up to Rp 1.7 trillion in the event Mitratel achieves certain performance milestones.(Khoirul Amin)