Manitoba Telecom Services Inc. (TSX: MBT) today announced its results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2008. Total revenues from continuing operations(1) increased by 2.6% and 2.5% for the three and six months ended June 30, 2008 to reach $486.4 million and $965.2 million, respectively. EPS(2) from continuing operations for the quarter increased by 2.5% to $0.81, and EBITDA(3) from continuing operations increased by 0.5% to $171.3 million, as compared to the previous year.
On a year to date basis, EPS from continuing operations increased by 7.1% to $1.65, and EBITDA from continuing operations increased by 1.3% to $340.0 million.
"MTS continued to deliver profitable growth during the second quarter," said Pierre Blouin, Chief Executive Officer. "These results were driven primarily by double-digit growth in growth services and the continued strong performance of both our Consumer Markets division and the Enterprise Solutions division, which delivered its third consecutive quarter of overall revenue growth."
Mr. Blouin continued, "We are well-positioned to achieve our growth targets for 2008, while continuing to provide an attractive dividend yield to our shareholders."
The Company has continued to reduce its cost structure and achieved efficiencies in its operations and reported annualized cost reductions of $20.1 million following the second quarter already reaching its 2008 cost reduction target of $20 million to $30 million of annualized expenses.
Double-digit growth in revenues from the Company's growth services portfolio, which includes wireless, converged Internet protocol ("IP"), unified communications, digital television and high-speed Internet services, strongly contributed to the gains posted by its continuing operations metrics in the three and six months ended June 30, 2008.
With revenues from growth services increasing by 15.4% to $214.9 million in the second quarter, and by 16.6% to $419.8 million in the first six months of the year, MTS is continuing to successfully increase its revenues from growth services while profitably transitioning its customers to growth services products. For the second quarter and year to date in 2007, respectively, growth services revenues contributed 44.2% and 43.5%, well ahead of the 39.3% and 38.2% contributions made to revenues from continuing operations in the comparable year-ago periods. -- www.cnxmarketlink.com
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