Vodafone Q1 revenue falls 4.5% on back of weak UK

Vodafone said revenue fell 4.5% to €13.37bn in the first quarter including a 5.3 percentage point negative impact from foreign exchange rate movements.

The company said trading in the quarter was consistent with management's expectations underlying the outlook statement for the 2017 financial year and confirmed its outlook for the full year.

UK service revenue declined 3.2%, reflecting the impact of operational challenges following a billing system migration, lower out of bundle revenues and the benefit of a large enterprise contract win in the first quarter of the prior fiscal year.

Mobile service revenue fell 3.6% with consumer contract in-bundle revenue growth being more than offset by a decline in out of bundle usage compared to the prior year and the impact of expanding roaming propositions in enterprise mobile.

Chief executive Vittorio Colao said European growth remained stable despite regulatory pressure on roaming revenue, with good performance in Germany, Spain and Italy.

“Our growth momentum in AMAP remains strong, with excellent performance in South Africa, Turkey and Egypt and ongoing recovery in India. Customers in multiple markets are attracted by our 'more-for-more' commercial offerings of larger data bundles and extra services, while we are seeing continued success with our fixed broadband and enterprise strategies," he said.