Telenor raises guidance after solid Q2, talks up cyber security progress

So far this year, it has blocked more than 1 billion attempted digital crimes against its customers in its home market, Telenor said. Fraudulent sites, phishing attempts and malware downloading are the most common incidents, in addition to many fraud attempts via phone calls and SMS, it said.

Corporate and public sector clients need help too though. Citing a survey conducted by Norstat, Telenor says one in five business leaders have experienced a cyberattack in the past 12 months – equal to 130,000 Norwegian companies. In addition, nine out of 10 business leaders have expressed concern about their operations potentially being crippled by a cyberattack.

To address these threats, the telco in June launched Telenor Cyberdefence, tasking it with rapidly developing advanced security products for the corporate market. It operates as a subsidiary of Telenor Amp, the division of Telenor that incubates and monetises companies that address adjacent markets.

Earlier this month, Telenor Cyberdefence made its first acquisition in the form security consultancy Combitech.

"We have taken a leading position in security and are showing that we mean business," said Telenor CEO Sigve Brekke. "We work every day to develop new and better products to take care of our customers. We now continue to attack this market with full force, which is necessary to protect our customers from well-organised, and increasingly sophisticated, criminal networks."

On a related note, Brekke was also encouraged about Telenor's recent strategic investments in AI – including its wide-ranging partnership with Nvidia – and sovereign cloud services, following its $10 million deal with Amazon Web Services (AWS).

"While I am satisfied with the solid results for the first half of the year, I am even more satisfied with the way we are reshaping and developing Telenor," Brekke said. "We have built a strong foundation for the next 5-10 years to come."

On that note, it is worth acknowledging the financial progress Telenor has made during the second quarter of this year.

Group service revenue weighed in at NOK16.3 billion ($1.5 billion), up 4.5% organically on last year. Its Nordic operation accounted for the lion's share – NOK11.2 billion – up 4%, which Telenor attributed to the popularity of its aforementioned security products, good momentum in Finland, and "strong contributions" in Sweden and Denmark.

Service revenue at Telenor Asia also grew, coming in at NOK4.8 billion – an increase of 6% – driven by growth in Bangladesh and Pakistan, and improving performance in Thailand.

Group EBITDA stood at NOK8.79 billion, up 3.8% organically. Higher contributions from affiliates and joint ventures, coupled with lower financial expenses, resulted in Telenor's quarterly net profit increasing to NOK2.98 billion from NOK1.43 billion.

Off the back of this impressive financial performance, Telenor raised its full-year guidance for service revenue growth to low-to-mid single digits from low single digit.

Meanwhile, Telenor's Swedish counterpart, Telia, also published some encouraging financials.

On a like-for-like basis, service revenue increased 2.5% to SEK19.4 billion ($1.84 billion), while adjusted EBITDA came in at SEK7.86 billion, up 5.3% on last year.

Telia said the performance was driven by good momentum in Sweden, Lithuania and Estonia. However, Finland was hit by declines in legacy services, and growth in Norway slowed as a solid performance in mobile was offset by falling fixed-line revenue.

"Revenue momentum in our telco operations continued in the second quarter, and customer satisfaction improved further. TV and Media returned to revenue growth and positive EBITDA," said Telia CEO Patrik Hofbauer. "Overall, the second quarter was in line with our expectations."