Vodafone CEO: Romanians reduce consumption

The worsening macroeconomic conditions have made Romania’s active population prefer savings over consumption this year, and this trend might become even stronger once loan interest rates and utility price increases start to show in bills, believes Liliana Solomon, CEO of Vodafone Romania, the second leading player on the mobile telephony market. The worsening macroeconomic climate combined with a wave of local and European regulations, the maturity and increase of competition on the mobile telephony market are starting to take their toll on the financial results of telecom operators. On Tuesday, Vodafone announced that its service revenues had advanced by 7.6% for the April-June 2008 period, the first quarter of the operator’s fiscal year, without providing any details. Orange, the leading mobile telephony operator on the Romanian market, in turn announced it achieved less than 10% growth rate for its first quarter business for the first time in recent years.