Pandemic year boosts GO fortunes with €185 million revenues, and new carbon pledge

GO reports €185 million revenues in 2020 pandemic year, an increase of €7.4m over 2019

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The telco GO has assessed its carbon footprint to commit itself to reduce its total emissions by 21% by 2024, and by 42% by 2029. 

The company announced it was recommending a 16c final net dividend to shareholders, the highest ever aid, after registering a strong financial performance during 2020.

Earlier this month it submitted an application for admissibility to listing of a €60 million bond issue with maturity in 2031.

Despite a significant drop in international roaming traffic due to the COVID travel restrictions, which led to GO’s local telecommunications segment suffering a marginal decline of 0.9% compared to 2019, the Group still generated revenue of €185.2 million, an increase of €7.4 million over the comparative year and a profit before tax of €20.9 million.   

“Our past and present investments continue to deliver additional value to GO and this year we invested €68.3 million, which is €19.1 million higher than the previous year,” CEO Nikhil Patil said.

GO remains one of the best performing publicly listed companies in Malta, with 2020 seeing the company rolling out its fibre-to-home network to a further 25,000 homes, taking the total homes using a GO service to 150,000. Works are also underway on a third submarine cable which will make GO the first operator in Malta to have links to France and Egypt, and completely transform the digital connectivity map of Malta.

GO also welcomed 5,300 new broadband customers and 9,500 mobile customers in 2020, giving it the biggest market share in Malta.

“If we are going to stay true to our purpose to drive a digital Malta, we need to digitise ourselves. Today, around 69% of our customers are interacting with our products and services using our digital channels when 3 years ago, that number was less than 15%,” Patil said. 

“By obsessing about our customers, we continued to grow market share and revenues, by acting like owners we maintained the utmost cost discipline across the Group, and by working together as one team, we mitigated the impacts of the pandemic and posted strong financial results.”

Over a five-year period, between 2016 and 2020, GO’s total shareholder return averaged 8.31% on an annualised basis, which equates to close to €104.5 in dividends paid.

GO Chairman Samir Saied said that 2020 proved how vital GO’s constant investment in its digital infrastructure has been, as it enabled the company to ensure fast, reliable and resilient connectivity, allowing people to remain emotionally connected during times when physical and social interaction was limited.  

“Like many other businesses, we had to be agile, innovative and responsive to keep people and businesses - connected to what matters most to them. We reacted swiftly to the pandemic, rolling out several customer-centric initiatives to ensure that everyone, even non-GO customers, remained connected. The challenges made us even more determined as a Group to continue delivering immense value to our shareholders, and the Maltese community,” Saied said. 

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