Thailand's top carrier AIS reported that its net new users in the second quarter of 2008 will be lower month-on-month and year-on-year, but expect higher profits for the period.

"Our Q2 earnings will show improvement from the year-ago quarter, but will not be as strong as the growth in Q1," AIS president Wichian Mektrakarn was also quoted by a Reuters report as saying.

Last month, AIS, 21.4%-owned by SingTel, reported a better-than-expected 29% rise in quarterly earnings as both revenues and subscriber numbers grew, the Reuters report said.

The outlook for the Thai telecom sector has improved this year on hopes that a pick-up in consumer confidence should boost mobile usage earnings and price competition will be less aggressive than in previous years, analysts said.

AIS, valued at $8.6 billion, has about 50% of the domestic mobile market and raised its tariffs in the first quarter, analysts said.

AIS had 25.1 million subscribers at the end of March, up 19.5% from a year earlier. It added a net 982,000 new subscribers in the quarter, up from 901,000 in the previous quarter. That compared to 884,000 net additions at rival DTAC, the Reuters report further said.

Source:telecomasia.net