Telus Corp. said Friday that the reliability of its network helped it add a record number of customers in the second quarter as it recorded a 45 per cent climb in net income.
“The hallmark of our organization pre-pandemic, during the pandemic, post the pandemic or any other exogenous event or any other industry development that happened is going to be consistency and excellence in execution,” said chief executive Darren Entwistle on an earnings call.
He declined to comment on the July 8 Rogers Communications Inc. outage that cut off services for millions of customers across Canada, but said that Telus is focused on keeping its own operations running well.
“The focus of this organization is leveraging the strength of our network performance.”
The company had a record 247,000 net customer additions for the second quarter, including 93,000 in mobile, thanks both to low turnover and added clients.
Higher subscriber numbers helped the company record a net income of $498 million for the second quarter, up from $344 million in the same period last year.
Earnings for the period ended June 30 amounted to 34 cents per share, up 36 per cent from 25 cents per share.
Profits rose as the company saw its average revenue per unit in mobile climb up 2.1 per cent as a return to international travel led to higher roaming revenues. The division is also seeing higher usage of 5G data as more customers use devices to stream videos.
On an adjusted basis, Telus reported a $422 million profit in the quarter, up more than 21 per cent from $348 million during the same period in 2021.
Revenue reached $4.4 billion in the second quarter, up seven per cent from $4.1 billion a year ago.
Mobile contributed the most to operating revenues with a 6.4 per cent increase to $1.6 billion, while the company’s investments in its health and agriculture segments are leading to growth. Health services saw revenue climb 7.9 per cent to $137 million and agriculture was up 39.7 per cent to $81 million.
Telus is actively working to grow the segments, including a deal in the quarter to buy LifeWorks Inc., an HR firm formerly known as Morneau Shepell.
LifeWorks helps companies with employee and family assistance plans, absence management, pension and benefits administration and retirement planning.
The deal, valuing the company at $2.9 billion including debt, is meant to help Telus push further into employee wellness and health care services. Telus Health offers virtual care and provides patients access to digital pharmacy options, home health monitoring and electronic health records.
The deal was approved by shareholders Thursday, Entwistle said.
– The Canadian Press
