RIL Q4 Takeaways: $100 billion revenue, ARPU inches higher, retail biz breaks records & others

However, despite record-breaking growth, the company missed many analyst estimates, which shows Street was expecting even better numbers from the most valuable company in India.

Below are the key takeaways from the March quarter and FY22 show of the oil-to-telecom major:

Another First for India Inc

RIL became the first-ever company in India to report over $100 billion in annual revenue. The company reported a record annual consolidated revenue at Rs 7,92,756 crore ($104.6 billion), which rose 47 per cent year-on-year (YoY).

The company also posted a record annual consolidated EBITDA at Rs 1,25,687 crore ($16.6 billion), up 28.8 per cent YoY. The annual consolidated profit after tax was also at a record Rs 67,845 crore ($9 billion) during the fiscal, up 26.2 per cent.

Shattering Records

The company said annual revenue for retail business was nearly Rs 2,00,000 crore. Annual EBITDA for retail business stood at Rs 12,423 crore ($1.6 billion) – an all-time high figure.

Annual revenue for digital services crossed the Rs 1,00,000 crore mark. Similarly, it reported a record annual EBITDA of the digital services business at Rs 40,268 crore ($5.3 billion). Annual EBITDA of the oil and gas business was at Rs 5,457 crore ($720 million), the highest in seven years.

Jio ARPU Surges

Reliance Jio said its average revenue per user (ARPU) – an important metric for telecom companies – climbed to Rs 167.60 in the quarter ending March, against Rs 151.60 in the previous quarter, a jump of Rs 16 or 10.5 per cent QoQ. Compared to last year, the metric grew 21.3 per cent. It was thanks to a tariff hike, better subscriber mix and ramp-up of FTTH services.

The ARPU is now higher than Rs 163 posted by Bharti Airtel in the previous quarter (Q3FY22). Though analysts expect Airtel, which is yet to publish its numbers, to also report a big jump in ARPU due to the tariff hike it took. It will be interesting to see if Jio has been able to close the gap or not.

Data Usage Spike

The company said its users are using more data than ever. The total data traffic was 24.6 billion GB during the quarter, a 47.5 per cent growth YoY. Given the company has 410.2 million users, the average data usage of 19.7 GB.

Similarly, total voice traffic for the company stood at 1.2 trillion minutes during the quarter, a 16.8 per cent growth YoY. Average voice consumption per user per month increased to 968 minutes.

Jio Fiber is No 1

The company management claimed that JioFiber is now the largest broadband provider in India within two years of launch. The company said Jio is now the #1 FTTH (fiber to the home) services provider in the country, with over 6 million connected premises. Jio consumers have over five hours of average daily engagement on the set-top box.

Progress report: Gigafactories

Although the company did not provide granular details, Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, RIL, said he was particularly happy with the progress in the New Energy and New Materials business.

“We are forging ahead with the development of our New Energy Giga Factories complex across 5,000 acres in Jamnagar. And with the strong global partnerships we have, I am confident that Reliance will create sustainable and affordable new energy solutions for India to help her meet growing energy needs while ensuring that we achieve our ambitious target of Net Carbon Zero by 2035,” he said.

The company last year announced a Rs 75,000 crore investment in green energy space.

15,000 Retail Stores

RIL’s retail arm continues to add stores at a rapid pace. The company said, as of now, a total 15,196 physical stores are operational, along with 793 stores that opened during the March quarter. During the year, over 2,500 stores. In comparison D-Mart has 284 operational stores.

It added that the area of operation stood at 41.6 million sq. feet compared to 33.8 million sq. feet in the corresponding quarter of the previous year.

The company said it created 1,50,000 new jobs during the year, taking the total employee count to over 3,61,000, making Reliance Retail one of the largest employers in the country.

Exports Ramp Up

Amid a thaw between Europe and Russia relations, which used to fulfil most of the former’s oil needs, RIL reported rapid growth in exports.

The company said exports (including deemed exports) from RIL’s India operations increased by 70.6 per cent to Rs 79,188 crore ($ 10.4 billion) as against Rs 46,406 crore in the corresponding quarter of the previous year, mainly due to higher price realizations.