ANKARA: Turkish GSM operator Avea accumulated a staggering TL 4.29 billion in losses over the course of the last five years, a recent report released by the state telecommunications watchdog has revealed.
A subsidiary of the partly state-owned Turk Telekom, Avea posted TL 784 million in losses at the end of 2014, and its losses for the period between 2010 and 2014 amounted to TL 4.29 billion.
The Information Technologies and Communications Authority (BTK) last week published a sectoral report for the first quarter of this year which disclosed the financial records of telecommunications operators as well as recent changes in their market share.
The leading operator, Turkcell, earned TL 2.3 billion in profits in 2014, and another operator, Vodafone, made TL 53 million. Turk Telekom, which has both fixed line and mobile services in its operations, posted a TL 2.4 billion profit in the same period.
Turk Telekom topped the list of most profitable telecommunications firms for the five-year period with TL 12.1 billion and was followed by Turkcell, which earned TL 11.5 billion. While Vodafone lost TL 933 billion in the same period, Avea posted a TL 4.29 billion loss, pulling the overall profit of the Turkish telecommunications industry down TL 18 billion.
The report also said that Vodafone made TL 368 million in investments in the first quarter of 2015, while Turkcell invested TL 221 million and Avea TL 158 million.
