Orange Q3 results meet targets despite unstable global context

Focus on the Lead the future strategic plan, prioritize value and operational efficiency.

3Q results fully in line with the confirmed 2023 financial targets.

Commenting on the publication of these results, Christel Heydemann, CEO of the Orange group, said:

“In an unstable global context, we are once again demonstrating our ability to execute our “Lead the future” strategic plan, which confirms us in achieving our ambitions for 2025.

In France and Europe, the quarterly results in retail services continue to illustrate the positive momentum driven by our value strategy, supported by the price increases that we are managing with the greatest attention. In Spain, discussions on the merger with MasMovil are continuing with a view to obtaining authorization from the European Commission by the end of the year.

Africa and the Middle East continue to show excellent performance and drive the Group’s growth, with revenues growing by more than 12% and ten countries recording double-digit growth.

In the Business market, rapid growth in IT&IS revenues of over 9% offsets the decline in our historical activities and Orange Business continues its transformation.

Finally, we are maintaining the dynamic of improving our efficiency through the execution of our cost reduction plan to overall accelerate the growth of our EBITDAaL in the third quarter (+1.4% vs. 1% in the second quarter) .

Building on these results for which I would like to warmly salute all of the Group’s teams, we confirm our objectives for the year 2023.

All together, we continue to build and strengthen the Orange Group, ensuring its competitiveness with confidence and determination. »

• Revenue for the 3rd quarter of 2023 stood at 10,999 million euros, up 1.8% year-on-year[1], or 194 million euros (after +2.6% in Q2 and +2.0% in H1). Revenue growth for the quarter is driven by the performance of retail services[2] which increased by 3.8%, or €304 million (after +4.3% in Q2 and +3.6% in H1) . It is in absolute value more than twice as high as the decrease in revenue from operator services which continues to decline by -6.7%, or -123 million euros (after -4.1% in Q2 and -5 .9% in H1).
• In France , continued growth in retail services excluding RTC at +3.4% and sales of mobile equipment at +3.0% offset the expected decline in revenue from operator services. Revenues thus continue to improve at -0.5% (after -1.3% in Q2 and -1.8% in Q1).
• In Europe , retail services revenues continue to grow by 2.3% thanks to the value strategy and despite an unfavorable base effect linked to price increases carried out gradually during 2022.
• Africa & Middle East continues its very strong growth of 12.2%, driven by the increase in double-digit growth of its four engines (+17.8% for mobile data, +17.0% for high fixed debit, +28.2% for Orange Money and transverse +20.3% for B2B).
• Revenue growth in IT Services & Integration in the Enterprise sector accelerates to +9.3% (after +8.8% in Q2 and +7.1% in H1) and more than offsets the structural decline of the historic Voice and Data. Business revenue increased by 0.6% due to the stability of mobile revenues, the increase in services being offset by the decline in equipment sales.
• On the commercial level[3], the Group maintains its position as leader in convergence with 11.9 million convergent customers across the Group (+1.0%) and its commercial momentum on mobile plans and access fixed very high speed. Mobile services have 250.9 million accesses (+4.2%), including 100.8 million packages (+9.0%). Fixed services totaled 44.8 million accesses (down -2.9%), including 16.0 million very high-speed accesses, still showing strong growth (+12.8%). Fixed low-speed access continues its structural decline (-14.3%).
• EBITDAaL growth accelerates to +1.4% in the 3rd quarter of 2023 (after +1.0% in Q2 and +0.5% in Q1), in line with the end-of-year objective. year. Despite the inflationary context, the operational efficiency program is following its trajectory towards achieving its objective of 600 million euros in 2025 on the defined cost base of 11.8 billion euros at the end of 2022.
• eCAPEX amounted to 1,597 million euros in the 3rd quarter of 2023, representing a reduction over one year of -7.0% in accordance with the objective of a strong reduction over the year . As of September 30, 2023, Orange has 70.0 million homes connected to FTTH across the world (up 11.9% year-on-year) and the FTTH customer base reached 15.0 million (+13.5%).

CT Bureau