Indus Towers on Wednesday reported a 4 percent year-on-year decline in its net profit for the quarter ended March 31, 2025, as higher finance costs and accounting adjustments related to its acquisition of towers from Bharti Airtel weighed on the bottom line. The company posted a net profit of Rs 1,779 crore for the fourth quarter, even as revenue rose 7.4 percent year-on-year to Rs 7,727 crore.
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One-Time Accounting Costs
"Return on Capital Employed improved to 29.1 percent as against 19.4 percent on Y-o-Y basis. Q4 FY25 had a write back of Rs 226 Crores in provision for doubtful receivables, aided by collections against past overdue," Indus Towers said in an exchange filing on April 30, 2025.
Additionally, the acquisition of telecom tower assets from Bharti Airtel earlier this year had a one-time accounting impact on earnings. "During the quarter, the Company acquired passive infrastructure assets from Bharti Airtel and accounted for the same as a common control transaction," Indus said.
Accordingly, the company said the Q4 FY25 financial results included an accounting impact of Rs 183 Crores for operating expenses and depreciation.
Tower and Co-location Additions
Operationally, Indus Towers reported strong growth, adding 14,662 macro towers during the quarter, bringing its total tower count to 249,305, with a closing sharing factor of 1.63. The company also added 18,616 co-locations, taking the total to 405,435. The quarter's tower additions included assets acquired from Bharti Airtel in a Rs 3,308.7 crore cash transaction, which contributed 10,380 macro towers and 2,226 lean co-locations.
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Optimistic Outlook Driven by Industry Momentum
"FY25 was another excellent year for us with an all-round performance. We delivered one of our highest-ever tower and co-location additions as we continued to garner a major share of our customers' rollouts," said Prachur Sah, Managing Director and CEO of Indus Towers.
"Further supplementing our additions was the acquisition of an important tower portfolio, reflecting our agility for driving growth. This has underpinned our robust financial performance, including healthy cash flow generation. I am also pleased to see that our continued engagement with a major customer ensured recovery of its overdues this year," Sah added.
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"We believe that the industry developments during the year have only strengthened the outlook for the Company and the sector. Given our inherent strengths and leadership position, we are confident of maintaining the momentum by capitalizing on customers' network expansion and available strategic opportunities." Sah concluded.
