Local telecoms provider Asia Pacific Telecom Co (亞太電信) expects to make a profit this year after a breakthrough in expanding its customer base to more than 2 million subscribers, a company executive said yesterday.
Following a revamp of its executive suites last year, Asia Pacific Telecom has cut its losses to NT$70 million (US$2.1 million) in the first three months of the year, a company statement said.
“The company’s management team has been working hard on improving its financial structure over the past year. Now, we are starting to see some positive results,” Asia Pacific said in a statement.
The management team led by chairwoman Sophia Chiu (邱純枝), who took the helm in January, has been overhauling the weak financial structure of the company and offering telecoms services at low prices to increase its economic scale after former chairwoman Wang Chin She-ying (王金世英) fled the country after allegations of embezzlement in 2007.
“We started returning to the black in April in terms of the bottom line,” chief financial officer Frances Chen (陳曉蘋) said. “And we expect to earn NT$720 million at the end of the year.”
The unlisted telecoms provider started offering telecoms services on CDMA 2000 technology similar to third-generation (3G) technology in 2003, two years before the nation’s major telecoms operators launched 3G services on WCDMA technology.
This month, Asia Pacific Telecom has signed up to 2 million subscribers and it aims to increase the number to 2.3 million by the end of the year, the company said.
The number of 3G users in Taiwan reached 11.6 million people as of May 20, National Communications Commission’s data show.
With more free cash flows coming in, Asia Pacific plans to boost capital spending this year to NT$1.5 billion from less than NT$300 million last year.
The company also plans to upgrade its network to EVDO technology next year in order to offer more data services on telephones, said Vincent Chih (遲煥國), executive assistant to Chiu.
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