Eir announce 1 billion investment over the next five years

eir will invest €1 billion over the next five years to develop our national FTTH network and upgrade their mobile network, enabling better coverage, capacity, and future 5G.

The news was announced alongside results for the first quarter ended 30 September 2018. EBITDA increased by €13 million or 11% year on year, while operating costs declined by €13 million or 12%. The company saw continued improvement in its key performance indicators, with more customers connecting to eir’s fibre broadband, bundling products, and consuming more TV content and mobile data than ever before.

eir will insource hundreds of customer care and sales jobs this year, as well as hire IT developers and 50 new open eir apprentices, encompassing up to 1,000 people in total.

Carolan Lennon, eir Chief Executive Officer, commented:

“We have begun a new financial year with another set of strong financial and operational results. Our first quarter performance was underpinned by solid growth momentum coupled with a continued increase in operational efficiency. We were pleased to deliver EBITDA growth of 11%, a reduction in operational costs of 12%, and an increase in cash generation of €44 million year on year. These results clearly demonstrate how eir is continuing on its transformational journey to become a leaner, more agile operation, with a focus on investment in infrastructure and people.

“In the last three months we have made some significant announcements relating to the future strategy of eir. We are busy preparing our large-scale capital investment programme, which will involve rolling out super-fast fibre-to-the-home broadband to 1.4 million premises in urban and suburban Ireland, as well as increasing our mobile network by 25%, with better coverage, traffic capacity, and network resilience. Along with our network investments, we are investing in our people, bringing in-house hundreds of customer care staff and sales representatives to enhance our customer experience, as well as hiring IT developers and 50 new open eir apprentices.

“With our voluntary redundancy programme largely complete, the insourcing of staff on-going, and the large network investments rolling out soon, eir will continue on its journey to become the best provider of broadband and mobile services in Ireland.”

Trading Highlights

Solid broadband growth

· 925,000 broadband customers, up 22,000 or 2% year on year

Continued growth in TV & sport

· 78,000 eir Vision customers, up 4,000 or 5% year on year

· Almost 270,000 eir Sport users across all platforms

More mobile customers opting for bundles

· 1,046,000 total mobile customers

· 52% of customers are on postpay, up 3p.p. year on year

· 25% of households include mobile in a bundle, up 3p.p. year on year

Household Revenue Generating Units (RGUs) growing

· 2.35 RGUs per household, up from 2.23 RGUs this time last year