HickoryTech reaffirms outlook as fiber & data revenue rises to $17M

HickoryTech's (Nasdaq: HTCO) fiber & data segment continues to be a major driver for the regional telco, rising 8 percent year-over-year to $17 million. Similar to previous quarters, the telco attributes the growth in this segment to an uptick in sales within its business and wholesale services as well as nine months of Fargo operations from its acquisition of Enventis.

The service provider said that year-to-date business services accounts for 56 percent and wholesale services accounts for 44 percent of fiber and data revenue. However, it reported that its net income of $1 million was a 30 percent decline from last year.

It saw similar gains in its equipment and telecom segments.

In the equipment segment, revenue rose 2 percent year over year to $15.3 million. Within this unit, equipment revenues declined 1 percent year-over-year to $12.8 million, while support services revenue rose 19 percent year-over-year to $2.5 million.

Telecom segment revenue was down 1 percent over a year ago to $15.6 million as declines in network access and local voice revenues offset broadband and TV growth. Broadband revenue rose 8 percent to $5.24 million as the telco's DSL and IPTV subscriber base increased by 5 percent and 10 percent, respectively. As of the end of the quarter, it had a total of 20,793 DSL and 11,327 IPTV subscribers.

Meanwhile, local service and network access revenues declined to $2.82 million and $4.3 million, respectively. The service provider ended the quarter with a total of 40,466 local voice access lines and 29,001 long-distance customers.

This quarter has been a time of transition HickoryTech. It announced in October that it would align all of its services under the Enventis brand. It will ask for shareholder approval to change its corporate name to Enventis Corp. at its shareholder meeting in May 2014.

HickoryTech has maintained its previous 2013 revenue guidance to be within a range of a 2 percent decline to a 3 percent increase as compared vs. 2012. The service provider said it expects growth in business services to offset the ongoing declines in legacy Telecom services.

Shares of HickoryTech were listed at $13.19 at the end of trading Monday on the Nasdaq stock exchange.

For more:
- see the earnings release

Earnings summary: Wireline telecom earnings in the third quarter of 2013

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