By: Amr Adel

Dubai – Mubasher: The customer base of Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Co. (du) is expected to further decline during the second quarter of the year, the company’s CEO Osman Sultan said in a conference call on Tuesday.

He attributed the expected decrease in subscribers to the application of the UAE government’s “My Number, My Identity” initiative, which requires all SIM cards to be registered in an effort to protect subscribers’ privacy and limit fraud.

Mobile service were cut from 610,000 subscribers in Q1, Sultan revealed, adding that this will be reflected on the second quarter as active subscribers are calculated within 90 working days.

du’s total mobile customer subscribers stood at 7.48 million by the end of Q1-15, down 0.9% from 7.55 million in Q1-14.

One million subscribers had their services cut off in 2014. Some were able to have their lines reactivated by updating their information, bringing the total of net reactivated subscribers to 578,000, representing 7% of the company’s subscriber base.

The Dubai-listed telecom operator is currently working on increasing its subscribers to make up for the lines which were cut off, the CEO said.

Earlier on Tuesday, du reported its first quarter financials, with net profits after royalties being flat on the year and reaching AED 487.1 million. Its profits for Q1-14 stood at AED 490.26 million.

Net profits before the deduction of royalties saw a 6.9% rise to AED 925 million during the quarter, the telecom operator said, adding that royalties increased 16.8% in Q1-15. The Dubai-listed operator previously reported a net profit growth of 6% after royalties, up to AED 2.11 billion from AED 2 billion in 2013.

The company’s shareholders approved on 17 March a cash dividend of 20 fils per share for the second half of 2014, bringing total dividends for 2014 to 32 fils per share.

Translated by: Nada Adel Sobhi