By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Bahamas Telecommunications Company's (BTC) top executive yesterday said the carrier is "poised for growth" despite a $9.2m year-over-year decline in its first-half revenue.

Sameer Bhatti, its chief executive, told Tribune Business that "the underlying organic business is healthy" after it was revealed that BTC's revenues for the six months to end-June 2025 were down 8.6 percent compared to the same period in 2024.

BTC's half-year revenue fall, from $106.9m in 2024 to $97.7m this year, was largely triggered by a $6.5m year-over-year drop for the 2025 second quarter. Top-line income for the three months to end-June 2025 fell by 11.7 percent, dropping from $55.6m to $49.1m this time around.

Mr Bhatti, though, told this newspaper that the revenue slippage - revealed in financial statements for BTC's ultimate parent, Liberty Latin America - was more "an apparent decline" than an actual one. He added that the carrier's performance this year is up against tough comparatives following a "tremendous" 2024 that benefited from "lumpy" income inflows especially during the first quarter and first half.

Asserting that BTC is "evolving from a telco to a techco", or a legacy telecommunications provider to a full-service technology company, Mr Bhatti said the "large projects" and completed initiatives that drove the 2024 first half performance will generate "new revenue streams" that are more durable going forward.

With these income flows set to kick-in, he predicted that the 2025 first half's year-over-year revenue decline is unlikely to represent a trend and the final six months will likely bring BTC back in line with top-line performance from prior years.

"Some people will call it a decline, but it's an apparent decline," Mr Bhatti asserted of the 2025 first-half. "What it is, we have two factors. The phasing of some large complex projects - and some of those projects started in 2023 - there were some delays that pushed the actual delivery of milestones into the 2024 first quarter, so that quarter had a big bump compared to 2023."

Explaining that international accounting standards allow companies to "book the revenue" once such milestones are hit, he added that the 2024 first-half was further strengthened by other "large projects" that came through although he did not identify them. Noting that their impact extended into the 2024 second quarter, Mr Bhatti said these "gave us a great start for the year".

"What we saw was a big lump in the first half of 2024 with rephasing and large projects," he told Tribune Business. "BTC is evolving from a 'telco' to a 'techco', and so you're going to see the evolution of product offerings. You'll see revenue streams from new sources, and what we started to see in the first of last year with new revenue streams continue.

"The underlying organic business is healthy and poised for growth based on those new revenue streams. It will be lumpy behaviour from time to time, but the underlying business is healthy. The way those project revenues were in there last year was pretty lumpy. There was another lump in the fourth quarter."

Mr Bhatti said BTC's performance is "consistent with what you'd expect and what you're seeing in the industry". He added that BTC will now start "pulling through new revenue streams related to" the projects and investments undertaken and completed in 2024.

Describing 2024 as a "stellar year", the BTC chief said this will translate into "more durable revenue streams". He added: "As we deliver on the milestones, the expectation is they'll pull through service revenues the following year rather than a one-time thing. What constitutes the top-line will be more durable going forward because of that."

As a private carrier, jointly owned by C&W Communications and the Government, which each hold a 49 percent equity interest, with the 2 percent balance held by the BTC Foundation, BTC is not obligated to release its full financial statements. And Liberty Latin America, in its results announcements, only discloses its subsidiaries' revenue figures.

Mr Bhatti, though, voiced optimism that BTC's top-line will translate into improved profitability. "Absolutely," he replied. "We are consistently leveraging technology and persons to drive desired efficiencies. We're building durable top-line revenue streams, and becoming more efficient in the allocation of resources.

"You'll see OCF (operating cash flow) expansion because we'll have durable revenue streams growth and further efficiencies and controls. You're going to see operating cash flow expansion."

Liberty Latin America's results, meanwhile, did disclose that 91 percent of the $32m cash deployed for financing activities during the 2025 first-half was to cover "$29m in distributions to a non-controlling interest in C&W Bahamas" - meaning dividend payments to the Government. 

Elsewhere, BTC saw mobile subscribers decline by a total 1,000 during the 2025 second quarter, losing 700 pre-paid and 300 post-paid clients. The carrier's total mobile subscribers stood at 157,800 as at end-June 2025, consisting of 132,900 pre-paid and 24,900 post-paid customers.

BTC also lost 1,100 revenue generating units (RGUs) or fixed-line customers during the 2025 second quarter. These included 800 fixed-line phone subscribers, 100 Internet customers and 200 TV clients. All told, its fixed-line relationships declined by 700 - a number that is different from the RGUs, as some persons took more than one service from BTC.

As at end-June 2025, BTC's network infrastructure passed 125,700 homes in The Bahamas. Revenue generating units numbered 64,100, and included 29,700 phone; 26,600 Internet; and 7,800 TV subscribers. Fixed-line relationships numbered 30,800.