Vi revenue +6% YoY, first net subscriber add since merger; loss narrows to ₹3,754 Cr

Vodafone Idea's consolidated revenue rose 6.0% YoY (3.2% QoQ) to ₹11,689 Cr in Q1FY27, roughly in line with Street estimates pegging the quarter at ₹11,450-11,561 Cr (Uniresearch, Zee Business), with EBITDA up 9.1% YoY to ₹5,034 Cr and margin expanding 122bps YoY to 43.1% (flat QoQ). The consolidated net loss narrowed to ₹3,754 Cr from ₹6,608 Cr a year ago, well ahead of Street's expected loss of ₹5,351-6,789 Cr, but the reported number is flattered by a ₹1,611 Cr net exceptional gain the year-ago quarter didn't have; stripped of that, the underlying loss was ₹5,365 Cr — only 18.8% narrower YoY versus the 43.2% improvement on a reported basis. Standalone tracked closely at a ₹3,712 Cr loss on ₹11,539 Cr revenue, no material divergence from the consolidated picture.

The margin gain was driven by ARPU rising 10.2% YoY to ₹195 — management's cited industry-high — on customer upgrades, alongside the company's first quarter of net subscriber addition since the Vodafone-Idea merger (193.1 million vs 192.8 million in Q4FY26). The ₹1,611 Cr exceptional gain itself comprised a ₹1,816 Cr non-cash remeasurement gain on settlement assets tied to the Vodafone India promoter arrangement, a ₹55 Cr labour-code impact, and a ₹205 Cr provision against a revised DoT demand under TDSAT dispute — all below the operating line and unrelated to the EBITDA improvement. Below EBITDA, depreciation (₹5,467 Cr) and finance costs (₹5,120 Cr) together still dwarf operating profit, which is why the business remains loss-making despite the topline and margin gains.

The stock went into the print at ₹12.92, down 8.9% over the past month of trading.

For context: this is the second-highest quarterly PAT of the last 6 quarters; revenue is at a 6-quarter high.

Management's prior-quarter guidance (Q4FY26 concall) called for double-digit revenue growth alongside net subscriber additions and EBITDA tripling over three years; this quarter's 6.0% YoY revenue growth trails that double-digit bar even as the subscriber-addition and ARPU-premiumization threads played out as guided — a mixed scorecard. CEO Abhijit Kishore framed the quarter as validating the company's "defined strategy and disciplined execution," citing the subscriber turn, 5G now live in over 200 cities, and ₹9,000 Cr of capex orders placed against the ₹45,000 Cr three-year plan; the company says it has secured ₹6,400 Cr of funding so far (warrants plus fund/non-fund facilities) and remains in talks with lenders to close the rest. Group net worth stayed deeply negative at ₹38,327 Cr, against deferred payment obligations of ₹1,30,299 Cr (spectrum) and ₹25,759 Cr (AGR); separately, the company received a ₹26.83 Cr DoT penalty notice on August 1, unrelated in size to the TDSAT provision booked this quarter.