JAMAICANS are accepting the price increases at large cable provider FLOW, according to John Reid, an executive at the provider’s new parent company Cable & Wireless Communications (CWC).

Reid, the former president of Columbus Communications and recently appointed president of CWC’s consumer group, added that regionally it would deploy its pricing power where it sees fit.

“Really, in Jamaica it’s a unique market because of the currency depreciation. We have leverage there to have price increases that are widely accepted across the country,” Reid said in response to a query at a CWC investor briefing held on Wednesday in a teleconference.

Next month, FLOW customers in Jamaica will see price increases between 53 and 66 per cent on certain services including Cable Your Way, Watch Late Bundle and Late Night Plus. The adjustments, however, will not affect subscribers of the Watch Basic, Basic (Plus), Premium and Ultimate programmes. Additionally, Max Pack and Watch Movie viewers are unaffected. FLOW last adjusted its pricing in the island in 2013.

“It’s accepted in the [Jamaican] market because of the constant depreciation that prices continue to increase, and it’s based on the fact that some of our costs are in US dollars,” added Reid who earlier indicated in his response that the company would identify pricing opportunities in each country across the region.

“We have identified opportunities throughout the region on a country-by-country product-by-product basis, and we will bring in that pricing power as we see fit in a competitive environment,” stated Reid. “But our success this year does not rely on any significant price increases in the retail market.”

CWC acquired Columbus Communications which operates as FLOW in much of the region in a deal completed in March. CWC argued that the acquisition would result in benefits to consumers regionally, but critics argued it could lead to price hikes by creating a large market leader.

Group earnings up

CWC group earning before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) totalled US$585 million, up 7.0 per cent year on year. It made a US$321 million profit for the year based on gains on the sale of discontinued operations.

Concurrently, CWC’s March year-end 2015 financials indicated that its LIME-branded subsidiary in Jamaica added more than 107,000 mobile subscribers in its 2015 financial year ending March. That would push its mobile subscribers to roughly 820,330, with Digicel Jamaica, its main rival, holding some two million subscribers. CWC added that Jamaica also witnessed a rapid increase in data usage and revenues.

“In the Caribbean, our Jamaica business continued to attract new mobile subscribers (up 107,000 or 15 per cent) and gain market share, leading to 19 per cent revenue growth (30 per cent at constant currency),” stated CWC on LIME Jamaica, which it said holds 28 per cent market share — up 3.0 percentage points on last year.

Latin American market

CWC chief executive Phil Bentley told shareholders that its acquisition of Columbus International puts Latin America as its core growth market rather than slower-growing nations of the Caribbean. In November 2014, CWC announced an agreement to acquire Columbus International for US$3.025 billion, which was completed on 31 March 2015.

“This is a transaction that transforms CWC, and is one that will accelerate the delivery of our strategy across the Caribbean and Latin America,” stated Bentley in the financials. “We have made good progress in executing our strategy and we are beginning to uncover the full potential of our business. CWC is on the way to becoming a better company — a genuine quad play operator, with strong market shares in the geographically focused and attractive Caribbean and Latin American markets. We see good long-term growth prospects across consumer, business solutions, and networks businesses, underpinned by our differentiated submarine and terrestrial fibre networks and full-service offering.”