SES H1: Revenue rises 10%
August 3, 2023
By Chris Forrester
SES reported a healthy rise of 9.8 per cent in overall revenues at €987 million for the six months to June 30th.
SES has rebutted recent rumours of further slippage in the launch schedule of next satellites the important mPOWER fleet. SES says two mPOWER craft (satellites 5 and 6) will launch during Q3 and commercial service of the fleet will begin later this year. mPOWER 7 and 8 will launch later in 2023. mPOWER satellites 9, 10 and 11 will launch in 2024.
The key verticals showed:
- Video division: €486 million, a fall of 5.2 per cent y-o-y.
- Networks division: €501 million, growth of 3.1 per cent (Mobility up 13.8 per cent)
Contract backlog at June 30th was €4.7 billion (€5.7 billion gross backlog including backlog with contractual break clauses).
SES announced it is spending €150 million on a share buy-back.
Ruy Pinto, acting CEO of SES, commented: “The strong start to the year continued into Q2 resulting in a solid H1 financial performance and confirmation of the 2023 financial outlook. Networks is growing on the back of strong performance in Mobility and robust outturns in Government and Fixed Data. In Video, we have signed additional important renewals which underpin the long-term cash fundamentals and value of our direct-to-home neighbourhoods.”
“With O3b mPOWER expected to be in commercial service by the end of this year, customers will benefit from an expanded set of capabilities for flexible, guaranteed, and high-performance connectivity to meet requirements in competitive, high growth segments,” added Pinto. “In Government, the Luxembourg Parliament recently approved funding for an important, multi-year commitment to O3b mPOWER, while the group of SES and other European space and telecom players has been selected to develop a proposal for the European Commission’s future satellite constellation, IRIS2.”
“Lastly, we are delighted to have cleared C-band ahead of schedule, after more than three years of hard work, and expect to receive the $3 billion [€2.7bn] (pre-tax) accelerated relocation payment in Q4 2023,” Pinto concluded.