Softbank Q4 profit surges on Sprint turnaround

Japan’s Softbank has reported a twelvefold increase in net profit for the March quarter as a result of a recovery at US mobile unit Sprint.

Profit increased to 580.5 billion yen ($5.08 billion), on the back of a nearly 2% increase in revenue to 2.32 trillion yen.

For the full year, profit grew to a record 1.4 trillion yen, up from 474 billion in the prior financial year, as the result of the divestment of part of the operator’s stake in Alibaba and cost reductions at Sprint.

Total revenue increased from 8.88 trillion yen to 8.9 trillion yen over the same period, partly due to the addition of revenue from recent acquisition ARM.

Sprint’s operating income increased to $1.8 billion for the year, from just $300 million in the prior year, while total costs were reduced to $15.9 billion, representing a $3.4 billion reduction over the past two years.

Revenue from domestic telco operations meanwhile grew to 3.19 trillion yen from 3.14 trillion yen a year earlier. The company added 360,000 mobile subs during the year to take its total to 32.4 million, with FTTH subscribers roughly doubling to 3.59 million.

SoftBank separately announced plans to collaborate with Qualcomm and Sprint to jointly develop technologies for 5G in the 2.5-GHz band, including developing the 3GPP new radio standard for the band.

The companies plan to provide commercial services and devices based on the development activities in late 2019.