Deutsche Telekom AG

XETRA:DTE

Earnings Call Transcript 2023-Q2

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Good morning, and welcome from Telekom headquarters in Bonn. Glad you made it. We have a lot of interesting information for you today, and that's why I don't want to waste too much time with my press intro, and we're talking about the figures for Q -- the first half of the year and the Board of Management, Christian Illek and Tim Höttges, the CEO, are giving the presentations.

Tim, you have the floor.

[Timotheus Höttges, executive]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My key message for today is that Deutsche Telekom, in the first half of this year, continues its growth course. We just keep going as always. Our businesses are developing well despite a complex market environment. We are meeting the targets we have set for our most important financial performance indicators. And on this basis, we are raising our guidance for the group's adjusted earnings, slightly raising it.

And there are 3 key factors driving our positive trend. First of all, our stable core business. Our customers stay loyal to us, and we are seeing a strong trend in terms of customer net adds. In fact, it's a record trend. Secondly, the consistent execution of our digital transformation, which is in line with our strategy. And thirdly, we are developing new fields of businesses that will help us to grow even more. And this is all based on strong figures that make it possible for us to keep on investing also in the future.

In the past 6 months, adjusted core EBITDA AL grew by 5.8%, and free cash flow grew by 10.9%. So Deutsche Telekom is consistently delivering good results, and we are an engine of digitalization and an anchor of stability despite an economic climate that is quite challenging.

In these increasingly complex times, we are naturally helped by our strong activities in the United States. We are so successful today, thanks to the consistent positive trend being posted quarter after quarter by our business on the most important mobile communications market worldwide. And this success is a result of the joint efforts of our colleagues in the United States and here at Deutsche Telekom in Bonn.

Since the Sprint takeover, we've been working together to create the world's most cutting-edge 5G network. Collectively, we've invested massive sums in infrastructure and spectrum. We have the best spectrum position, in fact, also as a result of smart M&A. And T-Mobile US today is symbolic of the transatlantic collaboration within the Deutsche Telekom Group.

I could spend ages talking about the synergies we are creating here, be it the joint development of high-speed Internet routers or the takeover of the One App in the United States, IoT business customers, all of which are also strong trends because there are more and more business customers using our products in the United States or the T Phone or advertising models that we are using on both sides of the pond.

And we can see the results more clearly than ever before. We are pleased to hold the majority in the most valuable mobile communications company worldwide. Right now, we are talking 51.3% as of the 30th of June to be precise. And we've worked long and hard to achieve this strategic objective. We started from the back of the field rather than rolling to the finish line from a head start. And ladies and gentlemen, I can't think of any other German company today with a similar success story in the United States.

Having said that, it's known that success breeds envy. And envy spread doubt. Are they too dependent? Do they have too much debt? Suddenly, we are accused by some media outlets of having an America problem as they say. They're saying that our success is make believe. Well, you know that I am also very fond of numbers, which is why rather than listening to those who envy us, I look at the figures we are presenting to you today, and they speak a clear language.

Deutsche Telekom is so successful, not only in America but actually because of America, and this success gives us leeway in Germany and in Europe. The fact that we can invest so much here, that we can invest more than our competitors is down to the strong trend that we have made possible, especially in the United States. The mainstays of our entrepreneurial success are and remain the strong businesses in the U.S. and in Europe. Both lend stability to the entire group. And by the way, they help us to grow.

So is that in and of itself a risk? Depending on how you look at it, yes. Is that a problem? Well, if it is, then it's not a bad problem to have, which is why I can say with total conviction, I would do the exact same thing in the United States again. But my feeling is that in this whole debate, people seem to forget to ask why fewer and fewer companies are investing in Germany and Europe. Why are they not investing on their home turf?

I think it's down to the conditions that are in place, and it is also down to misguided economic policy, I'd say. This particularly applies to the telecommunications market in Germany and Europe. Something urgently needs to change here. Maybe you've seen it yourself. All the telecommunications companies that are only active in Europe have lost about 50% of their value over the past few years. We cannot stand by and just watch our continent fall further and further behind our competitors.

We need economic policy that strengthens companies like us that are willing to invest billions. Instead, however, it seems to be accepted with them that growth is bad and that is enough to keep the status quo going forward that this would be enough. I think that's a fallacy. We must grow if we are to protect our prosperity.

Let me give you some [ negative ] examples from our industry. For too long, economic policy has centered just on the needs of the consumer and disregarded the needs of business. So it's only been about the best prices for consumers. It does not help, though, to solely focus on low consumer prices, neither does giving new providers privileges per se at the spectrum auctions.

We also do not need a service provider obligation on one of the most competitive markets in Europe. In Germany, we have 3x more service providers than in all other European markets. And we would like to get more political support in the debate on fair share as well because ultimately, what it comes down to is we want to safeguard prosperity and competitiveness in Europe.

If we carry on as before, we will forever be playing catch up when it comes to digitalization in Germany and Europe or fall even further behind. A word of caution, this will have implications for Germany and Europe as centers of business. We, as Deutsche Telekom, respond with rational entrepreneurial action. We are avowed Europeans, but we must also answer to our shareholders, and they expect from us that we invest our money where the odds of recouping it are greatest.

Should the general conditions not change? We would feel we had no other choice than to more keenly leverage our opportunities abroad, meaning mainly in the United States just like some other big German companies, which have recently made announcements to this effect. To prevent this from happening, we need different conditions in place here. And it's important that policymakers and businesses are closing ranks. We must work together to get Europe's economic order in shape for the future. We can only do this together. And I would hope that you, as media representatives, will help us to hammer home this message.

Ladies and gentlemen, as always, I will now present the figures for the first half of the year before Christian Illek will take you through the second quarter in more detail. Deutsche Telekom grew steadily across all KPIs in the first 6 months. That is, as in the first 3 months with 1 exception, and that's net revenue, which declined slightly. There's a reason for this, mind you, which you already know because I already explained it last time. Let me do it once again, though, because it's so important.

We are scaling back the terminal equipment business in the U.S., which impacts on T-Mobile US' revenue. However, this was a deliberate move on our part. The margin from this business was very low. So the business wasn't profitable at all. And more important to us are the high-margin service revenues, which are a mainstay of the group's earnings. And we continue to grow here.

Compared to the prior year, service revenues across the group increased by 2.9% on an organic basis in the first 6 months. Our adjusted core EBITDA AL is also growing in organic terms by as much as 5.8% in the first half year. This is also adjusted for the -- with withdrawal from terminal equipment business in the U.S.

With a sustained strong uptrend in our operational business again in the second quarter, we have now decided to slightly raise our guidance for earnings growth in the full year of 2023. We now expect earnings of around EUR 41 billion, and that's an organic increase of 4% compared to the prior year, and it is way above the targets that we've communicated previously to the capital markets.

Both our European and our U.S. operations are contributing to this increase, and I'm particularly pleased about the strong development of the Europe segment. We still expect free cash flow for the full year to come in at over EUR 16 billion. This strongly reflects, in particular, the effect of the progress we've made with the integration of Sprint, which is advancing faster and better than expected. Free cash flow in the prior year was still at EUR 11.2 billion, and we are aiming to see this grow by 40% now against 2022.

Ladies and gentlemen, let's now move on to the segments. In the United States, we added 2.9 million new postpaid customers, and that's the strongest customer growth in the market. Given this unabated positive trend, I am honestly at a loss as to how a mere rumor could lead to a significant decline in the price of the T share. You may remember, there was speculation by certain media outlets in early June about Amazon possibly using the fledgling DISH network in the United States to enter the mobile market itself. This precipitated a substantial drop in the share prices of the established mobile carriers, around 10% for T-Mobile US. However, a short time later, Amazon itself denied it was currently planning to launch its own wireless brand.

So let me get this straight. Everyone in the market was and is aware that DISH is entering the market as another network operator. By the way, Hamid Akhavan, who used to be a colleague of ours, is leading this company. Well, and that is part of the arrangements that we agreed in connection with the approval of our merger that DISH is entering the market.

At the end of July, it finally became clear to all market participants, Amazon is not entering the mobile market. Rather, DISH, like other providers, uses Amazon as a sales platform, nothing less but nothing more either. Mint and TracFone already have completely identical calling plans out there even today as we speak. So ultimately, this is an established model in the markets. So it turned out to be nothing more than a storm in a teacup.

T-Mobile US' share price has now largely recovered to the level prior to the Amazon rumors. The capital market thus honors the outstanding development of our U.S. subsidiary over the last few years, and it also values the expectations for the future, which are further growth potential on the basis of the United States' best mobile network.

Ladies and gentlemen, let me quickly run through some of the figures from our European segments, which are also very favorable. So just a quick look. In Germany, adjusted EBITDA AL increased on an organic basis by 3% in the first 6 months. In our European subsidiaries, earnings grew organically by 1.9%, and at T-Systems, growth stood at 3.2%.

We also hit a further milestone in terms of our network build-out. Today, almost 15 million households in Continental Europe can get an optical fiber line from Deutsche Telekom. To make this possible, we keep investing at record level, EUR 9.2 billion in the first half of the year alone. And that figure includes the scaleback of investments in the U.S. as planned, having largely achieved our targets for the accelerated 5G build-out.

In Germany, we are ramping up the FTTH build-out despite the difficulties posed by inflation, a shortage of civil engineering capacities and intense competition. Certainly, it didn't make that any easier for us. And although the IMF published a negative economic forecast for our home market of Germany, we fulfill our responsibility as the engine of digitalization on our home continent.

According to a global comparison study by the Aachen-based consulting company, Umlaut, which is comparing network providers worldwide, Deutsche Telekom's networks consistently place in top positions. And this is partly down to our systematic efforts to modernize them over the last few years.

Today, our networks bear little resemblance to those of old. They are fully digitalized. They run automatically and are either software-based or cloud-based, which is why I can say with total conviction, it is not infrastructure that is hindering the digital transformation in Germany. The problem is an unwillingness in public administration and in society to pursue digitalization. We need to become more dynamic in this regard, and Germany needs to enhance its aspiration and its speed of implementation in order to keep up with other providers worldwide.

Back to business. As I mentioned at the start, our customers appreciate our investments in our networks. And that's why we reached some record levels in Germany here, 870,000 new mobile contract customers in Germany and our European subsidiaries in the first half of the year alone. That's almost 100,000 more contract net additions than in the prior year period. It's a record number and a huge testament to the work of Srini Gopalan and Dominique Leroy, so the Germany team and the Europe team.

Over 240,000 new contract customers opted for a broadband line from Deutsche Telekom. Again, quality ultimately prevails. And we continue to step on it. In Germany, we have now launched our first-ever rate plans with a monthly cancellation option. I'm excited to see how they will fare.

Ladies and gentlemen, our standards are high, including and above all, when it comes to ourselves. As the leading digital telco, we are deeply invested in developing innovative solutions in the field of artificial intelligence. And we addressed the situation by aiming to unlock the full potential of generative AI, both for our customers and for the economy. We want to leverage this in the best possible way.

And to this end, we recently established the Global Telco AI Alliance together with Etisalat, Singtel and our partner, SK Telecom from South Korea. And I am particularly pleased that this alliance also stands for a bridge being built between Europe and Asia and that we are jointly pursuing an open vendor approach. Among other things, we want to build our own telco-specific large language model. And the launch of this project is an opportunity to lead the transformation of the market for AI solutions for our industry going forward. And it works in our favor that we've been investigating the opportunities and potential offered by AI for more than 5 years now.

And the same goes for the digital advertising market, where we have founded the ad tech company, U-tick, in partnership with Vodafone, Orange and Telefonica. We unified the strict standards for data privacy in Europe with the goal of putting a stop to annoying cookie consent pop-ups. Initial testing has been more than encouraging, and I am convinced that the first customers who are already using the service will be quite satisfied. And I'm convinced that made-in-Europe digital ad marketing can be a promising alternative to the American advertising platforms.

You might hear all these positive reports and think things are great at Deutsche Telekom. Well, generally, this is true. But we are also feeling the effects of the sharp price increases for energy and materials. Unlike in other industries, however, competitive pressure means we cannot simply offset higher costs by hiking our prices. And of course, we don't want to scale back our investments either, which means we need to become more efficient and take a look at our structures if we're able to continue making the necessary investments in our company's future viability, which is why our attention at the moment is on indirect cost within the company, which we want to continue bringing down especially in the centralized functions and what we call our shared services. Both digitalization and AI are expected to help us here, but we will also have to take a conventional approach by saving.

That's it for me for now. And now I'll hand you over to Christian Illek.

[Christian Illek, executive]

Thanks, Tim. First of all, good morning for my part. And I'm going to break down my comments into 3 sections. We'll start off with the group's financial results for the Q2 of '23, and then I'll go into the operating segments and, finally, the development of free cash flow, our leverage ratio and adjusted net profit.

Let's start with the group's financials. It's been a good development. Reported net revenue fell by almost EUR 700 million. It's declined year-on-year. This is due to mainly the 2 effects. The first was mentioned by Tim already, the planned reduction of the terminal device business in the U.S. and also a weaker dollar year-on-year, and that accounts for 60% of the decline in net revenue.

But the service revenues in the second quarter increased by EUR 319 million. That's 1.4% on a reported basis, and the reported adjusted EBITA AL in the group increased by 1.5% to EUR 10 billion, that's a growth of EUR 147 million. And this shows, in spite of the weaker dollar, we have a strong organic growth trend.

And let me look now at the operating segments. As usual, we'll start with the Americans. In the second quarter, the Americans saw a strong growth in customer numbers. On the whole, 1.6 million postpaid customers were won. That's more than AT&T and Verizon combined, and especially, telephony contract partners increased by 760,000. That is the highest growth in the industry for 8 years. And this has been carried by a very low postpaid phone churn at [ 0.7% ]. That's a record low and the best rate in the U.S. telecommunications industry, and this low churn rate also reflects project and the migration of former Sprint customers to the T-Mobile network.

Also high-speed Internet at home, that grew by 0.5 million in the second quarter. So in 5 quarters -- we've grown 5 quarters in a row. That's higher than the net additions at AT&T, Verizon, Charter and Contrast combined, with the customer base growing to 3.7 million by the middle of the year. That's a year-on-year growth of 2.1 million. So the U.S.A. is therefore completely on track for its target of reaching 7 million to 8 million customers by 2025.

This brings me to the financials for the Americans. Here, we see that a slight decline in segment revenue because of the terminal business -- equipment business, which is low margin. If you look at service revenue, however, it increased by 2.8% year-on-year, USD 625 million, and a very strong retail business, that was $625 million. So in sum, total core -- adjusted core EBIT increase by almost 11% year-on-year, and this is all based on the local currency, U.S. dollar.

This brings me to the figures for Germany. Let's start with the commercial's strong net additions in branded customers, [ 60,000 ] new customers, and that's an increase from 22,000 altogether year-on-year. Last year, we said this T -- the effect of the amended Telecommunications Act has been overcome, and the impact is not as great now. So this development makes -- this is an encouraging trend. Also, the number of fixed network customers with lines of 100 megabits or higher grew by around 1 million compared to middle 2022. So that's once again a continuous growth curve.

In FTTH area, we saw an increase of 64,000. So now we have more than 830,000 customers. And in addition to this, we have 650,000 customers in the premarketing stage, where we have completely -- completed the technical side, and we're expecting an annual growth of 100,000 customers.

This brings me to some very good figures for mobile. We saw very strong branded contract net adds in the second quarter with a growth of 319,000. In the prior year quarter, net adds had totaled 194,000. This increase in contract net adds in the consumer segment is attributable in part to the rate plan MAX Magenta and the launch of the new MAX Magenta tariff has generated a lot of customer interest. And what we also see is the churn rate among mobile customers improving to 0.8%, well below the same period for the previous year of 1%. This reflects the expiry effect from the Telecommunications Act.

This brings me to the revenue development in the German business. In mobile, we saw a growth of 2.1%. In organic terms in the fixed network, an increase of 1.4%. Total revenue in the second quarter was 1.9% up in the second quarter. In organic terms, 1.1%. Why is it higher in the reported area instead of organic terms? The difference is mainly due to the inclusion of MMS, which has not yet been included in the segment in the prior year quarter. And so the organic revenue growth of EUR 70 million reflects this increase in service revenues, with branded fixed network and mobile customers. By contrast, low-margin terminal equipment business declined by EUR 97 million.

Reported adjusted EBITDA AL increased by 4.1% organically, stable at EUR 2.5 million. We always see this range in organic terms of about 3%. And thus, the German segment has increased earnings for 27 consecutive quarters, and we're expecting no change there.

This brings me to the business in the Europe segment. Here, in Europe, growth continues to be robust and customer numbers across all business areas, also in revenue and earnings. We had 173,000 mobile contract net adds, and broadbrand net adds were 72,000. This means that the segment revenue -- reported segment revenue increased 6.2% to EUR 2.9 billion, and we're -- this included a net positive effect of EUR 36 million from changes in exchange rates, in particular, the strength of forint, zloty and Czech koruna. So in organic terms, segment revenue increased by 5.1%. That's a growth of EUR 139 million. And this is mostly driven by an increase in the high-value fixed network and mobile service revenues, around EUR 90 million.

This brings me in the next chart. Turning to T-Systems. T-Systems results for the second quarter puts it right on track to meet the annual guidance for 2023. Order entry over the last 12 months was 9.4%. Organically speaking, we saw an increase in revenue of 4.8%. This is attributable to the transfer of MMS to Telecom Deutschland. Revenue grew in the same way or saw the same trend, especially driven by digital solutions. Reported adjusted EBITDA AL increased organically by 2%. So we're on the right track to meet our guidance.

This brings me now in closing to our free cash flow, leverage revenues and adjusted net revenue. Free cash flow increased by EUR 800 million to EUR 3.5 billion. That's about 27%. This was driven by free cash flow, first of all, from operating activities, amounting to about EUR 700 million as well as cash CapEx decline of almost EUR 600 million, although the reduction in the U.S. was even EUR 800 million. In particular, the increase in lease payments had an effect on cash flow, an increase in lease payments at T-Mobile compared to 2022. And also, we have the digi towers business. The cell tower portfolio in Germany and Austria was deconsolidated, leading a change in leasing payments for us.

This brings me to adjusted net profit. This has declined to around EUR 560 million lower year-on-year. There's good reasons for this. Adjusted EBIT increased by EUR 146 million. Depreciation, amortization and impairment losses declined by EUR 602 million. This was attributable to the reduction in the terminal lease business in the U.S. and also the deconsolidation of the tower business, which we are ramping down on a continuous basis. The biggest growth affects what we see is EUR 7.1 million -- billion in cash flow being generated in the first quarter.

This brings me to the -- as we said, EUR 146 million EBITDA growth that was strongly driven by network integration. The biggest change came in the financial result. We have slightly higher interest costs. We've had to carry and also other financial results. We've had provision effects of an additional EUR 500 million. And also the option for the forward declined, and that accounted for a decline of almost EUR 1 billion.

If I look at recurring adjusted earnings. We see and we take these effects into account. We see that our DPS grew by about EUR 0.07, and growth was about 9%.

This brings me to net debt and the financial ratios. These grew, not excluding leases, by 4.4% to EUR 97.2 billion. As I said in the Q1 call, this is due mostly to a high dividend payments of EUR 3.6 billion and a share buyback in the U.S. amounting to almost EUR 7 billion. So these are payments made to shareholders. And as I said, the effect on net debt has been a slight increase in the second quarter.

But in the first half of the year, we are still have 2.40, up from 2.31 at the end of March 2023. This means that basically, we're on a sustainable track with regard to our debt, our net debt, and with this, we're on track to achieve our financial ratio targets as announced at our Capital Markets Day. And this progress and leverage ratio has prompted Standard & Poor's to raise their rating in May to BBB+ with a stable outlook. So things are looking good.

And with that, I'll turn the floor back to Tim.

[Timotheus Höttges, executive]

Thank you, Christian. Allow me to sum up. Deutsche Telekom is growing across all key areas. Our customer numbers are developing very well. We are growing on both sides of the Atlantic. In Germany, we have now seen organic earnings growth for 27 quarters in succession and for 22 consecutive quarters in Europe. We are raising our full year earnings guidance for the second time in the current year, mind you. And this is thanks to the businesses on both sides of the Atlantic.

We're on track to meet the goals we set in respect of our fiber-to-the-home build-out despite the difficult framework, the rise in costs and inflation. We have further extended our stake in T-Mobile US beyond the 50% mark. We stand at 51.3% now. We've improved our leverage ratio compared to this time last year. In May, Standard & Poor's upgraded our rating to BBB+ with a stable outlook. And this puts us well within our comfort zone with the 3 -- the big 3 rating agencies. We are endeavoring to offset cost increases on the market with savings in our indirect costs.

And when it comes to digitalization, we are now moving even faster than before using AI. So in a nutshell, we are making clear progress towards our goals. Maybe we will even exceed our goals. And here, I'm talking about the goals that we communicated at Capital Markets Day. We will certainly meet them, possibly exceed them.

Now we're looking forward to your questions.

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Thanks a lot. We are now having the Q&A. [Operator Instructions] So I'm looking at my screen here. I'm not seeing a question right now. But yes, there is [ Mr. Mishka ]. Can you hear us?

[Unknown Attendee]

Yes. Can you hear me all right? I have 2 questions. First of all, for how long can you rule out that there will be price increases? And if you were to increase prices, what products would be affected by that in the first step?

And secondly, talking about AI. What does that mean when you're saying that you want to become more efficient and you want to tackle your structures? And when will you announce staff cuts?

[Timotheus Höttges, executive]

On your first question, competition in the German market is extremely dynamic. And when you look at how prices are soaring for food, prices for other consumer products have also increased considerably, then we're talking the double-digit range. Prices in the telecommunication sector are minus 1% compared to the prior years. And like I said, competition in our market is fierce, also because we have virtual network operators and other providers are using our infrastructure. So we can't continue with the current prices. We want to keep our market shares. We want to retain our customers, and we want to make sure that customer satisfaction remains high.

So let me tell you here quite clearly. Price increases are necessary for us in many areas because costs are much higher, but I'm afraid we will be able to push it through in the market. And ultimately, it's more important for me to keep our customers on board than trying to make a quick buck.

Then you asked about AI. When it comes to AI, we're not talking about staff cuts. Obviously, some routine activities in our company may be replaced by AI. We may be using bots to become more efficient, for instance. However, we are always striving to make our service even better. Last week, for instance, I tried to renew my credit card, and I would have liked to sort this out with a bot to be quite honest with you. It was so complicated.

So AI will help us to ultimately improve customer service even further. It's not really about staff cuts. Of course, we will have to do some reshuffling. But don't forget that we are also hiring new staff. I'm just thinking of optical fiber rollout. We hired 1,000 people who are helping us to roll out the optical fiber network in Germany right now because otherwise, it would not be possible. All the prompting needs to be done by someone. We need AI experts for that.

The digital transformation in our company, the cloudification of infrastructure are all things that we need staff for. We want to be the leading telco, which means that we actually need more people on board. And we are using AI as a tool that will not necessarily lead to job cuts. It is more about helping this organization to have a higher level of automation and to serve its customers even more efficiently. And that's why we will not announce any possible staff cuts here.

[Christian Illek, executive]

I'd like to add to this, Tim. When you look at the domestic group and how the workforce has developed here over the past 10 to 15 years, then you will find that every year, there's been a decrease of around 3,000 to 4,000 employees. And they are no longer on board because they've been replaced by state-of-the-art technologies or they've become obsolete for other reasons, and we'll continue that. So we are not announcing any major restructuring programs because it's a continuous trend that we've seen for years and years, and we've always managed this in a socially compatible way, and we'll continue to do that. But if there are any AI effects, then they will be part of this equation, but it's not a big new project that we would have to announce here. And demographic trend also helps us here, mind you.

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Okay. So [ Mr. Mishka ], has this answered your question? Then we can continue.

[Unknown Attendee]

Actually, I have another question. So are you saying that in 2024, there will be no staff cuts at all? Are you ruling that out?

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

I think we've answered this question on possible staff cuts in a very detailed manner. Let's continue with [ Mr. Jansen ]. I can see you on my preview monitor here.

[Unknown Attendee]

Right. I hope you can hear me.

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Go ahead.

[Unknown Attendee]

I have 3 questions that are to do with your interesting comments on the overall economic situation and the regulatory framework. Mr. Höttges, what opportunities do you have to gain an even better profile in the United States? Are you considering to gain an even better stake, an even higher stake? Of course, you'd have to invest in areas where you can make some more money.

And then you talked about the service provider obligation. You said that we no longer need that and also for the assigning of frequency. So that's to do with regulation. And I was wondering if this was sorted out the way you would like to see it sorted out, would that suffice? Or are there any other obstacles?

And what are your comments on the deal of Vodafone and 1&1? And what does that mean for you?

[Timotheus Höttges, executive]

Excellent questions. Let me start with the first one. So first of all, there's one thing that a lot of people tend to forget, which is European telcos over the past few years have lost about 50% of their market capitalization. We've, however, increased -- improved our market capitalization, especially because we're so strong in the States. But the question is, how did that come about? Is it because all the other managers are just idiots? So is it to do with the regulatory framework? Companies need to be able to invest. Customers want 5G and optical fiber, and we are lagging behind. But at the same time, these companies are no longer able to cover their cost of capital, which means they're investing now, but it doesn't pay off, which means that the capital market is getting suspicious of this industry.

Why is it that we need this high level of competition here? Revenue per customer here is about 1/3 of what you will find in the U.S. But still, everybody says, we don't have enough competition here. We need to bring consumer prices down for telecommunications products. Why? And those telcos that are only operating in Europe are suffering from that, but nobody seems to mind that.

The fact that European companies can no longer afford to invest even though we need these investments to digitalize our society is more or less ignored. And we can see the consequences here. And that's why I'm saying, at some stage, policymakers need to ask themselves what's the right mix of having the right consumer prices, which are significantly below the U.S. market here, by the way, and the necessary investments and the return on investments that is so important for the companies investing all that money.

Prices and competition for mobile communications in Germany, for instance, are very much under pressure. And I can tell you that this deal between Vodafone and 1&1, well, at the beginning, we were kind of cautious, and we did not enter into a roaming agreement with 1&1, and we are not directly affected by this. If at all, we are affected indirectly.

But it has become clear that for pure wholesale providers, it has become possible in this market to gain access to infrastructure without having to invest any money themselves, which is why there is a major competition between O2 and Vodafone. They are competing for additional margins in order to be able to work in a profitable way, which isn't good for the overall market. It is not -- it is good for the service providers, mind you, because once again, they've made it possible to gain access to large infrastructures without having to pay anything themselves, without having to make any investments themselves. And I don't understand why we have this debate on the service provider obligation in Germany in the first place. I mean what's the point?

If Amazon and the likes are granted a legal right to access our infrastructure, is that acceptable even though we've invested billions of euros to make that possible? And by the way, the German telecommunications market has 35% of the service providers in this country. And other European countries' service providers only account for 10%. And I don't know why we want to reinforce this trend. I mean the only reason seems to be that they want to bring down consumer prices, but that is not the right prerequisite for future investments on our part.

So my point is regulation is not focusing on the right points. Rather than fostering the network build-out in Germany and Europe, we are creating artificial auctions where network providers need to pay a lot of money to the government, but that does not support the network rollout. In 2024, there's going to be another major auction. Rather than trying to strike a balance between infrastructure investments on the one hand and the right consumer prices on the other, we are debating a service provider obligation for Germany in order to bring consumer prices down even further. And U.S. companies right now are using 90% of the telecommunications providers' infrastructure. And this trend is increasing by 30% to 40%, and they're not even paying for it. The telecommunications companies are making zero, zero return from that.

I mean all this traffic on our networks from the Internet is so expensive, and we cannot pass on the cost to anyone. And we're not getting any support from the German government. We are saying, wouldn't it be fair if others from abroad who are also using our networks have a share in the cost? No. We need to bear the burden all by ourselves. So where is all this money supposed to come from?

And in the U.S., the situation is completely different. The U.S. market has much better regulation. There, the framework is much better, and the regulators are much smarter. When it comes to 5G, for instance, I mean we now have already almost 300 million customers who can use the 5G network. And the new fiber market is emerging in the U.S. right now. I'm not going to tell you what opportunities we have at the moment, but I can guarantee you that Deutsche Telekom, with its [ 100 billion ] in the U.S. and all its customers, has a lot of options of improving and enlarging its business, making it even more profitable in the U.S. We don't have to invest here where it's not profitable.

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Yes. Let's carry on. I see [ Mr. Davids ] on my preview monitor. [ Mr. Davids ], you're up.

[Unknown Attendee]

Can you hear me? The topic you just mentioned or just went into, I have a follow-up question. National -- underlying national conditions must improve. Otherwise, the focus, looking at the U.S., it will just be stronger in the market there. So what does this mean for us? Does it mean that you would invest less in Europe or in Germany? And just to take an example, you said that service provider obligation, which will probably be introduced because the policymaking arena has given some positive signals in this direction. So we can expect this obligation, and this is an element where you say that's a no go.

What are you going to do then? So are you going to decrease investment then if that obligation is introduced? Or will you vent? Can you explain your frustration there and tell us what you would do then if this obligation -- service provider obligation is introduced, what you -- how you would react? And yes, what would you do, especially in Germany?

[Timotheus Höttges, executive]

Well, I don't think it is a good idea to introduce the service obligation because it would be counterproductive for the entire infrastructure in Germany, not only for telecom. And it would also have consequences for build-out intensity. Why should we build out the network for everyone else? I don't see any logic there. And I don't know if it would be very smart if all Internet platforms throughout the world were invited to -- and provide them a very generous right to use our infrastructure.

If you had this service provider obligation, every service provider would always say the price is too high. They'll always say that. So the regulatory authorities will always be under pressure because they're always screaming the prices too high. They'd like to have it for nothing. They have access, and whatever the price is, it's too high. We know that from history, actually, after 25 years of regulation and also operating the mobile network. I think this whole discussion about a service provider obligation is absurd.

And the second question is, what would the consequences be? We already started a war game at our company and asked the question, what would it mean if we had a fourth competitor in Germany who is not able to build out their network on their own power right now? And they're being given privileges through access to spectrum by policymakers, and they can also -- roaming with O2 or the Vodafone network, access to the Vodafone network, of course, that has an impact on the intensity of competition in the market. And this deal would not be good for the German market. And I'll say that very clearly here.

This changes the metrics of investments, investments in quality, investments in differentiation. And you're rewarded for it. But that's being eliminated here, this reward, by providing such access rights, and that's why we have to adjust our approach and see what we want to do. But it's too early to draw any conclusions yet right now regarding our policy.

What was the last point in your question? Yes. We work in 3 markets: in Germany, Europe and the U.S. And I would like to invest more in Germany, and we do that. We make a disproportionately high investment. And just look at the figures, why do we do it? Because we can. And why can we? Because of the performance of the American business, and we have that to support us. We couldn't invest as much as we do if we didn't have this enormous cash flow from the United States. And these other companies like Vodafone and O2 don't have this advantage, and that's why we have an advantage, which helps us build out fiber optic in Europe, and we're investing a lot more than the competition now in Europe.

But we have to really look at the cold hard facts. We're not talking about making patriotic decisions at Telekom. Rather, we have to justify what we do to our shareholders and justify what we do with the money they invested in our company, and that's what we're doing.

Yes, and we have ongoing commitments from Capital Market Day 2021. And these are scheduled to expire in 2024. And then we'll have a new Capital Market Day. Then we might make new priorities. But everything we've communicated at the Capital Market Day 2021 and assume there's an obligation or a commitment, we're sticking to it.

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Yes. Thank you very much. We have to keep an eye on the clock. I see [ Ms. Pironka ] in our virtual waiting room and I would ask her to state her questions.

[Unknown Attendee]

Yes, the criticism of the German economic policy, could you point your finger a little more precisely at perhaps certain ministers or certain political parties that are focusing too much on consumers or the Federal Network Agency? Who needs to rethink things most?

And regarding the cost reduction program, when we talk about staff downsizing, will you stick to the plan as you have so far? And how are you going to increase? How are you going to boost efficiency if you continue to downsize staff?

[Timotheus Höttges, executive]

Now let me start with the first question. You said that we've -- this really relates to the staff in Germany, and we've been downsizing for years continuously on an average of 3,000 to 4,000 staff members per year. And nobody is talking about a downsizing program. It's basically reassigning staff. And we want to stick to that. That's not a big bang. In principle, this is integrated in our business system. We do it every year, and we do it in tandem with labor, and we do it in a socially compatible manner.

With regarding more precise criticism, we have a very complex decision-making process here, whether it's in the digital single market that doesn't exist for Europe, whether banking union, which doesn't exist for Europe. And I could give you further examples from the area of business and industry. Europe needs to wake up, and Germany needs to wake up. We're involved in international competition with the American digital sphere. They are incredibly strong, and they are getting stronger. And they have a policy in America that promotes infrastructure, and companies are able to structure their prices without artificial interference by regulatory authorities.

The European regulatory policy over the last 25 years has not changed in terms of the underlying principles. And we are all feeling the consequences, every citizen, every consumer. And given this, this overregulation has to stop. And if it doesn't, then more and more companies will leave.

We've had this discussion about energy prices. Deutsche Telekom has 2.5 terawatt hours per year that we have to buy in the market. We try to do that as low price as possible. But electrical prices on a [ EUR 0.10 ] basis in international comparison are a huge burden for us. And there's no simple answer here, and there's no one person who's responsible for this either. I think there's a lot of policymakers out there who have good intentions, the best of intentions. But unfortunately, we're not able, right now, to have a targeted change in policy that will transform the business and industry. We're always trying to find compromises which, at the end of the day, don't really change things.

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Okay. Then let's carry on with [ Mr. Arendt ].

[Unknown Attendee]

I wanted to ask, recently, there were rumors that BT and Great Britain wanted to -- that you were thinking about taking it over. What -- you were critical of that statement. What do you mean with your comment on that? And what are you planning in Great Britain?

[Timotheus Höttges, executive]

Well, we haven't made any decision about the BT stake. We'll give you the standard answer. It's part of our pension fund, the 12%. We're happy about the dividend payment, and I don't want to comment any further on that.

[Philipp Schindera, executive]

Okay. Then that brings us to the end of the Q&A. [ Mr. Buchen ], I'm sorry, but due to the late hour, we're not going to be able to answer your question. But if you send it to us by e-mail, we'll get back to you.

And thank you for your participation, everybody, this morning and the call in. Digital X is scheduled for the 20th and 21st, and we'll invite you to come to Cologne to Digital X in the usual format with the usual program for you. You know the program will be in Cologne, and we'd ask you to come to the media evening on the 19th. And the invitation should have already been set out the 19th of September, the 19th -- and that's -- and Digital X on the 20th and 21st of September. See you then.

[Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]