Elisa Oyj (ELISA) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Elisa's Second Quarter 2021 Conference Call. I'm Vesa Sahivirta, Head of Investor Relations. And here together with me is a very familiar team, CEO, Veli-Matti Mattila; and CFO, Jari Kinnunen. We start this call with the presentation followed by Q&A. And because we don't have any audience here, we go straight to the conference call lines in our Q&A session. Now we are ready to start, so I give word to Veli-Matti. Please.

Thank you, Vesa, and welcome to Elisa's interim report second quarter 2021 on my behalf as well. Let me start off the highlights from the second quarter. We had a good development continuing at Elisa. Revenue growing by 5%. EBITDA -- comparable EBITDA being up by 2%. Mobile service revenue was increasing by 4.2% year-on-year. And the postpaid churn stayed at the same level comparing to the first quarter this year, but it was up from the second quarter last year when we had the COVID limiting the traffic in the retail channel, and that time, the churn was somewhat lower. Postpaid mobile subscription base increased by 36,700, of which machine-to-machine and IoT contributed 30,800. Fixed broadband subscription base was decreasing a little bit, 5,100. And the good momentum in 5G continues. Our network, which is the -- which has the largest coverage in Finland, covers now over 50% of Finns in 110 towns and cities. Also, we continue to see a higher satisfaction by our customers of 5G comparing to the 4G customers. And also, we see on average more than EUR 3, higher monthly billing for 5G customers. Revenue growth was coming partly from the acquisitions and the content partnership with Nordic Entertainment Group, but also organic development came brought with mobile services, domestic digital services and equipment sales growth to the revenue. In terms of the EBITDA growth, in comparable numbers, the revenue growth, of course, was contributing as well as our continuous improvement in efficiency. Mobile service revenue growth, of course, was partly contributed to the fact that the comparable year ago eased, because now also the comparable quarter, i.e., second quarter 2020, didn't have roaming revenues hardly at all like it was now, but that the underlying growth in our upselling as well as in 4G as well as in 5G and also some product pricing changes contributed to this good development. The churn, of course, reflects the competitive intensity, which is quite high in the Finnish market, both in the consumer segment as well as in the corporate side. And the -- for example, we see gift card campaigning and things like that, which is, of course, creating a traffic in the -- between the operators of customers, but we are capable of responding to that, but that reflects to the higher churn and explains the higher churn. In general, we can say that there's no material change in the level of competitive intensity in the market. It has been intensive, and it was intensive in the second quarter as well. When we look at the segments. First in the consumer side, revenue up 6% with the already mentioned drivers and EBITDA was up by 5% in the Consumer Customers business. The corporate side, the revenue growth was 4% and the EBITDA was minus 2%. And as we see the negative EBITDA development has turned less negative, it still is slightly negative, but I have an assumption that the -- with the continuous improvement, we can get the EBITDA development positive in the corporate side as well going forward. We execute our strategy continuously. We have a clear purpose to create sustainable future through digitalization throughout, and that inspires allegiance. And we have really wide range of deliverables that we can do to improve the environment, improve the different aspects of the society with our services, and by focusing on increasing to -- the mobile and fixed services. And the value of those services to customers, we know that we can also increase the revenues also. In the digital service areas, we have both in the domestic side as well as in the international domain, growth opportunities also inorganically. And of course, the continuous improvement, focusing on the customer quality by which we are differentiating ourselves clearly to the competition continues and is -- has brought results, but also all of these 3 focus areas have great potential going forward. In the mobile side, we continue to see the smartphone penetration going up step-by-step now. 92% of customers are using the kind of new type of smartphone, and 10% of those are now 5G capable. So the kind of addressable market for mobile data connectivity continuously increases in our customer base. 80% of the voice subscribers are at the moment at 4G or 5G speeds. But as you can see from the picture here, the lowest speed tier continues to go down in 4G, meaning that the upselling within the 4G also continues favorably. And the proportion of data bundles of the subscription base also continues to go up. So the long kind of lasting business model change continues from the usage-based subscriptions to the fixed-monthly-fee bundles. Elisa is a leader globally in the 5G deployment, and we continue to have most extensive network in Finland. Like I said, the availability is in 110 towns and cities and we have overall population coverage of 50%. But in the largest cities, over 90% and up to 90% of the population coverage in the largest cities. The customer demand for higher speeds also later on, with the other features and performance improvements that 5G will bring along, continues, and the customers are more satisfied. We continue very, let's say, precisely to measure the satisfaction of customers within our mobile base like in all the customer base. And we see clearly that the 5G customers have higher recommendation rate clearly than the 4G customers. And that is, of course, the main driver. The better customer experience overall now driven mostly by higher speeds, that makes customers to pay, on average, more than 3% in the monthly billing. And as a leader, to commercialize 5G really in the world, we can show this kind of a great development, of course, contributing to the positive development in MSR. We have been also the first operator in Nordics to pilot a stand-alone 5G network in our commercial network. And we have it in the limited areas geographically at the moment, and it is in pilot phase, but we are expecting that sometime next year, we will have a very wide delivery of stand-alone 5G to customers. Of course, there is also a need for end-user equipment that are supporting the standalone, providing, of course, great new opportunities for improved applications for our customers. We also delivered private 5G networks, for example, to the ports of Pori and HaminaKotka. And we have tens of customer cases where companies are piloting, and they are starting to utilize these private mobile networks of different sorts. They are starting to use them to benefit of the more advanced applications for the needs of the industry and logistics, among other things. In digital services, we see growth both domestically and in international domain. For example, at Elisa Viihde IPTV, we have launched original series successfully. Bad Apples and Bull by the Horns, for example, became the most popular titles in the service during their launch period. Also, in our IT services, we have solid growth. And we are helping customers to have IT more automized way. But also we, for example, utilize the deliveries of Google Cloud Platform to help our customers to move forward in digitalization. In the international digital services, we had a record second quarter for camLine in the invoice services and, for example, CalcuQuote for customer acquisition in Europe. And we also had a first sale of 3DVisualizr solution to SedApta customer base during the quarter. So active cooperation between the acquired companies. And our organic development in these international digital services continues and further develops. And we continue active scanning for the new acquisition opportunities in the international digital services businesses domain. And then I will go through the outlook and the guidance for the rest of the year. The uncertainty in the macroeconomic environment is still prevailing, and the competition in Finnish market continues to remain keen. We reiterate our guidance that our revenue will be slightly higher than 2020 and comparable EBITDA will be at the same level or slightly higher than in 2020. And the capital expenditures will be maximum 12% of revenue. Now I ask Jari to continue from the financial review point.

Thank you. Let's first go to profit and loss. And Q2 was a good continuation of growth trend, both in revenue and earnings, 5% growth in revenue, EUR 23.5 million. And if you look different elements behind that. Interconnection and visitor roaming had slightly negative impact, minus EUR 1 million; equipment sales, EUR 6 million increase. In corporate segment service revenues, there was a positive trend. Last quarter was still slightly negative, minus EUR 1 million, now, plus EUR 2 million. Both domestic and international digital services positive impact as well as mobile services. Negative impact, the traditional fixed line services. In consumer segment, a strong EUR 16 million service revenue growth. Mobile service revenue and domestic digital services contributing strongly to that. Negative impact from traditional fixed services. Earnings-wise, reported EBITDA includes EUR 6 million personnel reduction expenses one-off personnel reduction expenses, in employee expenses line. And comparable EBITDA, excluding that one-off, 2.2% growth to EUR 172 million. EBIT growth was 4.4% to EUR 105 million. Financial expenses, slightly lower than a year ago, and the EPS growth, 5.9% to EUR 0.56 (sic) EUR 0.52. Also, in Estonia, a good development and revenue growth was 8.4%. EBITDA growth to 1.4%. Revenue growth, driven by equipment sales and the service revenue, both fixed and mobile service revenues. And service revenues, both number of subscriptions as well as some price changes, price increases. And in mobile services, upselling to higher speeds, all contributing to growth. In mobile subscription base, growth continued as well, 10,800. Growth and -- in prepaid subscription based, 2,900 decrease. Churn was at a low level at 8.5%. Capital expenditure and CapEx. Comparable CapEx excluding licenses and lease agreements was EUR 64 million in Q2. First half CapEx, excluding licenses and lease agreements, EUR 112 million, very much same level as last year. And first half CapEx to sales, well in line with the guidance at 11.6%. Main CapEx, 5G and 4G capacity and coverage increases as well as network and IT investments. Q2 cash flow was strong. And the comparable cash flow as well as reported cash flow, EUR 101 million, 19% increase from last year, positive contribution from net working capital change as a result of a lower inventories and higher payables. Also, slight positive impact from lower financing expenses, negative cash flow impact from higher paid taxes and lower reported EBITDA. First half comparable cash flow, slightly higher than last year at EUR 161 million. Operating cash flow conversion to EBITDA at 63%, slightly up from last year, 61%. Then capital structure, net debt-to-EBITDA end of Q2 was 2x, same as a year ago. Distributions were paid in the second quarter and that impacted the net debt. We expect that in the second half, net debt will reduce. Equity ratio was also well in line at in -- well in line with the target at 35.8%. And the return ratios continued at good level. Return on equity, 29.4%, and return on investments at 16.3%. In terms of financing, good maturity profile, no short-term financing needs, and the average interest expense well below 1%. And now I will give word to Vesa, please.

Thank you, Jari. And now we move on to Q&A and to conference call lines. May we have the first question from the line, please?

[Operator Instructions] We have a first question. It's from Andrew Lee.

It's Andrew Lee from Goldman here. I had 2 questions. First was on operating leverage, which is, I guess, a key investor concern this morning. You obviously had some dilution from acquisitions. And also, you had tough churn comps this quarter. But how would you convince investors the underlying business is continuing to generate a decent operating leverage of what was quite a good underlying growth -- top line growth quarter? That was question #1. And then question 2. We'd anticipated 5G to boost your growth, your top line growth. And mobile service revenue this year, I think you previously suggested it would be more maybe second half loaded. So I wonder if you could just talk through if we should anticipate an acceleration in mobile service revenue growth into the second half. And how we should think about the comparable EBITDA trends in the second half? I know you've guided to overall EBITDA being flattish. But on a kind of underlying basis, should we see comparable EBITDA trends improve in the second half?

All right. First, in regards to the operating leverage. We have been growing our comparable EBITDA this year. And as you mentioned, we had in the comparable quarter a lower churn, which meant that the sales cost were higher than in the comparable because the churn was higher here. So the sales costs have paired some kind of a negative development, if you will, from that end. Of course, we are moving forward with the revenue growth, as we have been guiding. And the EBITDA guidance stays very firmly intact, same level or slightly higher. And we believe that we can with our revenue growth, but as well as with our continuous improvement in productivity to continue to have a positive development in our -- on our results and EBITDA as well. In terms of the 5G, we have, of course, 5G momentum going and moving and continuing. As we have said already 2, 3 years ago, 5G will first bring benefits for the customers with higher speeds, and that's what takes place now. We still can sell upgrades in 4G domain as well even if the price competition is more heavy in the 4G domain. In 5G side, the price competition is still limited. We do see some -- time to time, some aggressiveness with the 5G pricing, but the price aggressiveness is mostly focusing on the 4G domain. However, also, the 4G domain in that area, we can have upselling to work. In terms of MSR forecasts, even if we have tended not to give any numbers, but we would think that the MSR will be approximately on the same level for the second half as we saw in the -- during the second quarter. Roaming revenues, we do not expect to have any material increase in the second half of the year.

We have a question from Michael Joel.

It was actually Nick Lyall. I must have been very mumbled when I said my name. Sorry. It's Nick from SocGen. Could I ask, guys, on the -- going back to Andrew's point just there about operational leverage. Could you talk a little bit about the staff costs this quarter? They were up sharply even before the restructuring EUR 6 million. So could you just tell us what's going on there? You look as if you've reduced 100 staff as well in the quarter and inflation is quite high. So is that something we need to -- I wouldn't be concerned about, but something we need to bear in mind for the second half? Is there something going on there?

Okay. I will start and then I'll let Jari to elaborate. As you know, we are doing acquisitions, which means that we are getting more people. We are getting, of course, more revenues and potential for further increase in the revenue and profit. We also had quite many small restructuring projects leading to reduction of personnel, close to 100 people, which was not visible yet in the reported numbers, but that relates to the EUR 6 million restructuring cost. But I'll let Jari to elaborate a bit further on the employment cost side.

Yes. The -- I'm not saying EUR 17 million. So of course, the restructuring cost, EUR 6 million, is a big part of that. camLine acquisition impacted EUR 4 million. We had collective labor agreement increases beginning of the year, so approximately 2% increase. So it's between EUR 1 million and EUR 2 million impact coming from that. So these are the main impacts. Also, there was somewhat a higher number of employees compared to a year ago other than acquisitions which impacted to that. Now this EUR 6 million, as Veli-Matti said, close to 100 reduction, that is still in the number of employee numbers included, but it will reduce over the time from the employee numbers.

Okay. But extra EUR 6 million, this is a sort of sustainable number for staff cost. There's no other one-offs in there.

So EUR 6 million is one-off restructuring.

Yes. And then the rest is normal. Okay.

We have a next question by Maurice Patrick at Barclays.

Just a couple of questions from me, please. In the slide deck, you talk about private networks on 5G and you cite a couple of ports. I'm sure you don't want to give details of those contracts. But could you help us understand the sort of magnitude of these kind of contracts in the sort of wider scheme of Elisa? It's a question best get a lot around how big is the private network opportunity. So any thoughts on sort of KPIs, and that would be helpful. And the second question really relates to, Veli, your comments in your prepared remarks around B2B, where you said you were confident to get EBITDA back to growth again. I mean how much of that is sort of your growth areas? And how much of that legacy -- sort of turning down some of the legacy sort of impacted competition you're seeing?

Okay. In terms of this private network, 5G, let's say, businesses, at the moment, the revenue impact is still quite low. We are in the beginning of, let's say, utilizing 5G in a new ways for businesses, for example, with private network solutions. I believe that the opportunity is really, really big going forward. But it comes over time over several years due to the fact that in order for companies to kind of additionally invest in private 5G networks, they, of course, need to have some benefits for it. And the benefits come not until there are specific applications for that industry or that company that they are taking into use or they can have some -- that -- or they have some existing applications that can be really utilizing the higher performance that the 5G private networks can be produced. Because the 5G private network is an additional cost, of course, and it needs to be financed somehow. And the financing comes when there will be some cost reduction, productivity improvement, quality improvement, you name it, benefit for the company. That's why I believe that it will take some time that these benefits are being found by piloting, experimenting and so forth. We are doing a really active work with the large customer base we have in Finland. And also, in Estonia later on, we will do. But we -- I'm sure that we will be finding together with the customers real, let's say, material growth opportunity. But at the moment, it's -- the revenues from those cases are not so significant at all. In regards to the B2B EBITDA improvement, we know at Elisa, we have the culture for continuous improvement. And that is bearing the results anyhow over time also in B2B side. That's why I have strong trust on positive development. But also, we have -- even if the roaming comparable is not hurting the corporate business so much at all anymore, but there are still some companies that are delaying their decisions, for example, for some new projects due to the COVID uncertainties. And when the vaccination rates are going up, I'm sure that these uncertainties will be going away. And we will get more to the normal, let's say, appetite for digitalization with all the companies. This uncertainty and delayed projects, delayed decisions is not over all the B2B customer base, but there are enough customers which has some negative impact to the B2B business.

Our next question is by Terence Tsui.

I just got a couple of questions on mobile service revenues, please. The first one is, you continue to make quite optimistic comments around 5G. I think in the past, you've said that 5G should contribute around 100 basis points to MSR growth this year. Does that continue to be the case? Or are you feeling a bit more optimistic about that after the strong Q2 prints? And then secondly, just a quick clarification on the answer you gave to the first question around the trajectory of MSR for H2. Were you saying it's going to be similar to Q2 on an absolute basis or in the growth rate, please?

Okay. Thank you for the questions. In regards to the MSR, our estimate for 5G's contribution remains the same, approximately 1%, 100 base points for the full year. And of course, we are doing everything that it would be more, but that's our estimate, what we can provide you with. The other elements, of course, contributing to the great development in MSR where the speed upgrades upselling in other areas than 5G, some of the price changes, and of course, this roaming comparable -- comparability situation changing. In H2, we believe that from the growth point of view, the growth percentage will be approximately the same level in H2 what it was in second quarter. Hopefully, this explain it.

The next question is by Peter Nielsen.

2 questions, please. You've partly covered one of them, Veli-Matti, from the previous questions. But there clearly has been an object to service revenues. And it would appear that there is a boost from the fact that Q2 last year was obviously severely impacted by the pandemic. And my question would be, if you expect to see that sort of a similar uplift in the coming quarters simply from the fact that we are sort of not coming fully out of the pandemic, so there is a recovery versus last year. But I guess you already answered it in the preceding question. But any color here? How much you think is just simply a year-over-year base effect? And then can I just ask you one on your comments on 5G, which are obviously very positive? Can you tell us anything, Veli-Matti, about how do you feel your share of new 5G customers or for 5G uptick in the Finnish market? Would you say that within 5G, you're taking more than your fair share of customers at the moment given your leading position? Any color you can give us would be helpful.

All right. Thank you, Peter. The MSR really, what we see is that we can say that approximately -- around 2%, the roaming has been contributing negatively during the past quarters. Now we don't have that headwind. So it means that the underlying MSR growth has been 2% and continues to be. And now we don't have in the comparables in the next couple of quarters. Of course, next year, second quarter situation is different, and we will kind of gain for the year. So that's how it looks like, the development. Of course, then when we -- hopefully, we'll start to see roaming revenues to go up to the levels approximately what they were. There is, of course, a positive momentum again. But like I said, we are not expecting that to happen during this year. The traveling still seems to be getting up and running, if you will, quite slowly. In regards to the share of 5G upgrades, our belief is that we are getting approximately our worth of our market share of these new 5G customers. We see our competitors also being active in the 5G market. So our target is really -- and focus is really upselling our own customer base and get the customers to move overall not that much of kind of increasing our market share with 5G. We are really eager to make sure that we can create value for customers so much that they are happy to pay like they are a bit more. And with this upselling, we can make a good development going forward.

Our next question is by Si Hu of Credit Plus.

Siyi He, from Citigroup. And I have 2 question, please. And the first question is the MSR growth trajectory. I understand that for the second half, you think that you could be able to grow at similar level to Q2, which is around 4%. I mean given the strong performance in Q2, I wonder whether this gives you more confidence that the mobile service revenue growth going forward could actually go back to the 3% to 5% growth forecast that Elisa used to target? And my second question is on 5G customers. I know you don't give 5G customer numbers. But I wonder if you can comment on the pace of the customer migrates. I think from 3G to 4G, every quarter, we see about 2% to 3% of customer base migrate to 4G from 3G. And I wonder if you can talk about what you see your 3G to 4G customers might migrate to 5G every quarter. I appreciate some color on that.

Thank you for your questions. In regards to the MSR and going forward, like we have discussed many times in the past, MSR is also very much related to the price competition that we see in the market, which is something we cannot control. We have quite intensive and quite price competitive market, especially in the 4G domain. There is, of course, a potential there to have even improvement in MSR if that would be somehow changing. But we are not counting on that. And like I said, we cannot forecast how the pricing is developing and the price discipline is developing in the market. But with the level of what we see now in the market, we can say that we believe that the second half of this year, maybe even going forward would be the level of what we saw in the second quarter. In terms of the 5G customer increase and the pace of how the customers are migrating. For the first, I can say that it is going according to our expectations. But I would also like to say that we really are focusing on making sure that we are generating value -- additional value to our customers. It's more important for us to generate more -- a higher customer value with 5G, secure that. And by doing that, securing that we will get more money, we will get higher customer billing, which we continue to do. So that's why we are not so eager to kind of accelerate or have kind of all the efforts to do the accelerate the migration because it would be for nothing if we could -- like I said earlier also have said, we could by overnight have all the customers, 5G customers, but we wouldn't get any additional MSR. So we are focusing on all the things to make sure that customers are perceiving to get higher value and they are then willing to pay more. And that's what we see. Unfortunately, I cannot comment more on the pace what it is. But what I can say that it is according to the expectations we set to ourselves already 2, 3 years ago. And we are continuously working, of course, that we understand all the potential value improvements that customers can get from 5G. Of which, of course, the one main thing is the additional speed, but there are many other elements also going forward. And that's why we are -- we can give this kind of forecast also for the rest of the year for MSR.

We have the next question by Sami Sarkamies.

Okay. I have 3 questions. Firstly, going back to the operating leverage discussion earlier. If we look at the underlying OpEx development, it grew 8% in Q2 after 4% in Q1. Did I understand right that this was mostly driven by the abnormal low churn in Q2 last year? And then going into second half of the year when you're against, let's say, more normal comparables, we should go back to the OpEx growth rate of Q1.

Okay. Yes. For the most, you have analyzed it well. Yes.

Okay. And then the second question is on the restructuring charges and the programs you conducted in Q2. Can you elaborate a bit more on what these were about? And then was it so that the sort of savings impact was not yet visible in Q2, but it will become visible later on?

Okay. Very good. Just having a first comment here. I'll let Jari to elaborate a bit more. When we are -- having these restructurings, I just want to maybe repeat what I've said and we've said earlier, that when we are developing our productivity at Elisa, we are doing that from the customer quality improvement point of view first and also improving automation of course, to make lead time shorter and quality higher. And time to time, those kind of developments, they lead to reduction of tasks and jobs. And now we just had quite a few of those kind of projects, smaller projects, not one big project, but smaller projects to be completed. And that's why we had quite a bit of onetime restructuring costs. But I'll let Jari to elaborate a bit more.

Yes. Your conclusion regarding service impact is correct. So we had now the EUR 6 million restructuring expense, but the benefits, i.e. reducing expenses are coming later in the coming quarters out of that.

Okay. And then finally, a detailed question for Jari. Can you disclose net sales and EBITDA contribution from camLine in the second quarter, please?

Revenue, approximately EUR 5 million, EBITDA impact, 2 point -- 1.5%.

Our next question is by Artem Beletski.

Yes. I guess it's presumably me. This is Artem from SEB. Still 2 from my side. So first of all, starting with digital services. Could you maybe talk about different business lines? How those have been developing during the quarter? I remember you have been talking about video conferencing, for example, being impacted by lockdowns. Whether that situation has now improved. And the second question is relating to machine-to-machine and IoT subscriptions. So you show still continued very robust growth on that side. Could you maybe talk a bit more about key growth drivers there? Is it basically just the amount of connected devices or potentially some services what you are introducing to the market or then also, for example, 5G?

Okay. In terms of the digital services, if we take the domestic first, both the Elisa Viihde IPTV has growth. It has, of course, growth from the Nordic Entertainment Group cooperation because we kind of are having the revenue they used to have in Finland. But we have also kind of separate Elisa Viihde IPTV revenue growth there as well. IT business has some growth as well continuously step-by-step. In the international side, in our video conferencing, we had faced some challenges still in regards to the fact that companies are not at the offices and the demand for Videra's gateway and integration solutions haven't been that large. So that we haven't seen the growth in the video conferencing that these cloud providers. However, saying that, now we have positive signs when the companies have really started to plan to return to the offices and to the hybrid work. And that's exactly the time now when the Videra's unique capabilities will be in demand to integrate the room systems and the systems of various vendors also to the cloud video systems like Zoom or Teams or so and to make that fluent. So we see early signs now about positive development for Videra's demand. Then in the area of international software business, there is a very good continuous improvement in revenue side there. Good work together with the organic services. And also, our acquired companies, there's a great integration, great collaboration and cross-selling happening, with positive developments. In the telecom software business, there's many positive things going on. One thing is that the operators -- telecom operators seem to be also a bit delaying their projects, even kind of ordered projects. So we see a little bit COVID-related headwind from -- for the DSP business. But overall, the outlook and the developments also in that front look positive going forward. In regards to the machine-to-machine, IoT, it is really that there are more and more connected devices. For example, for people who want to have a different kind of cameras for hunting reasons or so. There are many, many connected devices now coming to the market, and we have been able to capitalize on that. There are some companies also starting to utilize more and more different sensors. So this market probably will continue to have great growth. Of course, the ARPU for these subscriptions is low. But anyhow, it is a positive, positive business line as well.

The next question is from Adam Fox at HSBC.

It's Adam Fox-Rumley here from HSBC. I just had a couple of follow-ups, if you don't mind. So firstly, I wondered if you could comment on the customer perception and how that's changing of your mobile network with the 5G push. Obviously, Elisa is pushing hard, but so are your competitors. So is this a case of relative gain? Or is it -- yes, just I'd be interested to know your comments there. Secondly, going back to the workforce. I suppose at a slightly higher level, I'm interested in whether -- as your digital services business gets more traction, whether you -- which direction you think the workforce will go? Do you think that into the medium term you need to be a bit larger as you take on more projects or those become more complicated? Or does the continuous improvement that you've been talking about just continue on that side? And then a final question, on Estonia, where I think the operating leverage is kind of most stock. Lots of revenue growth, but your margin is 2 points lower year-on-year. So if there's anything you could say specifically about that, that would be helpful.

Okay. In regards to customer perception of our network quality, overall, we have the best quality in our mobile network we have had. And it is driven by the automated solutions that we've done, but also of the many improvements we have done, quality driven for our operations. When we then think about having the 5G, of course, having the largest coverage of the network improves the perception competitively. Our competitors have quite good coverages as well. So how large this differences in perception, I cannot really, really say. But when we have measured the Net Promoter Score, and that has been measured also for our competition, we are somewhat ahead with the Net Promoter Score for 5G in regards to -- or in comparison to our competitors. But that's continuous improvement that we do. It is step-by-step development of both the real quality in the network, but also the different other aspects which are impacting to the perception of our customers. In terms of the workforce, the main increase for our workforce in the future comes from the acquisitions that we believe -- I believe we are continuing to do. We, of course, have the continuous improvement for our existing activities, which has, time to time, negative or decreasing kind of impact to the tasks and workforce. But the increases that we may see, they relate to the acquisitions. In the Estonian business, I can let Jari to comment on that. Jari, please.

Yes. First of all, of course, quarters are not always equal in terms of OpEx, and it varies. And this is also relating to earlier operating leverage discussion in the group level. And we had -- in Estonia, we had last year one credit, so EUR 0.5 million credit which reduced the expenses. So that's one thing that impacted the year-on-year comparison. And another thing, regarding revenue growth, of course, 8% growth. As I said earlier, that there were 2 elements, sort of service revenue growth and equipment sales growth. And the equipment sales are low-margin revenues, so that is also a contributor in this quarter.

[Operator Instructions] The next question is Cabejšek.

I guess it's, Ondrej from UBS. I had a clarifying question, and I'm sorry to go on this on 5G still, and I apologize if this was addressed better, but I got disconnected for a while. So I want to ask about a slight contradiction at least in terms of my perception as to the, first of all, expectations that you were saying are going according to plan in terms of the migration from 4G to 5G. And we saw this quarter that assuming there was a roughly neutral year-over-year impact in terms of roaming, that the majority of the 4% growth in service revenues would have been down for 5G. So you're already kind of ahead in terms of year-over-year end guidance, which is the kind of second point that we have from you, the 1 percentage point contribution. So can you maybe address a bit the expectations that clearly are, I think, ahead of your initial guidance? And how we should think about that in terms of the second half and then onwards?

Thank you for the question. I'm not sure if I heard properly what you were asking. I'll try to respond, and then please ask again if I missed your point of your question. But in terms of MSR contribution from 5G, we still reiterate that it is approximately 1 percentage point for the year. The additional MSR growth comes from the vast base of our other customers than 5G customers still moving up to the higher speed tiers, which we have several in those areas as well. So it's not only that we can get from customers to move from one technology generation to another when we can do upselling. It is also within those generations, like within 4G generation, when the customers stay into 4G, we can have them to move to higher speeds. Also, what we do, we have some price increases to take place when we are modifying a bit of the value and deliverable that the customers are getting from the 4G subscriptions. That contributes as well. So those -- the 5G as well as the upselling price changes for the other customers, those are contributing to the growth of MSR.

So just to confirm that the upsell on 4G is a bigger impact than the composition that you are addressing is still pretty strong on 4G? So there is still positive growth from 4G at this stage.

Yes. Yes, exactly. Even if the competitive situation in terms of price -- pricing is having a negative impact in the 4G domain, we still can make some growth in MSR within 4G, yes.

And so that would imply that the -- if we break down the 4% -- 4.2%, that the larger contribution is still coming from 4G than 5G. Can you confirm that?

Well, since the -- we can say that the underlying growth, except the roaming, comparable impact was around 2%. So we can say that the -- we have approximately half and half, we can say going forward from 5G and then 4G.

Our next question comes from Abhilash Mohapatra.

Yes. This is Abhilash Mohapatra from Berenberg. I've got 3, please. Specific on your -- the corporate mobile ARPUs, which seem to recover sort of definitely at least sort of better than what I was expecting. Just given there's no -- there hasn't been any real return in roaming, I would just be interested to hear your thoughts on sort of the trends that you're seeing there and why that sort of picked up. Secondly, just a quick one around because of employee and sort of restructuring costs. A few questions on that today. I mean, just big picture, I mean, if you look at your trends historically, I mean you're probably one of the few telcos who have actually continued to deliver growing EBITDA despite a rising headcount. And you've had very low restructuring costs compared to the sector. Barely -- I'm just looking at the numbers. You are barely EUR 40 million cumulative restructuring costs over the last decade. I mean is there any reason to think that any of that is changing sort of going forward? And then finally, just a broader question on growth. You sort of outlined a few impediments to growth. At the moment, there's obviously -- you talked about the price competition in 4G, which is sort of dampening ARPUs. You talked about the slow demand in B2B, which sort of hasn't picked up yet post the sort of COVID pandemic. I mean if these -- and despite that, you sort of delivered the 4% MSR and then sort of 2% EBITDA. So as these headwinds start to abate, is it fair to expect that growth should get stronger from these levels generally?

Okay. Thank you for the questions. In terms of the corporate mobile ARPU, of course, we see the 5G to contribute in the 4G side -- in the corporate side as well. But also, the fact that we -- since we lost one quite large public sector deal where the -- many of the cities step-by-step are changing from Elisa subscriptions to the competition. Those subscriptions are very low ARPU subscriptions so the dilutive impact of that customer is gradually also raising our ARPU, even if, on absolute terms, it's a bit negative to our MSR. But as we have said earlier, it's less than EUR 1 million per quarter on absolute terms if it kind of realized -- will be realized for all the cities. So that is partly improving the ARPU that -- losing the low ARPU customers, but also the 5G is starting to show a result in corporate ARPU side. The employee situation and the development there, the restructuring cost levels, so I don't expect to have any major change over the long term. What we have seen in the past, at Elisa, how we move forward. We work with a continuous improvement where, of course, when we will have a task to be ceased and completed in certain projects for automation or just project -- process improvements, we also find new task for Elisa' in some new areas of our business, but time to time, there will be kind of reductions, but they are quite small overall over time. So I don't expect major change on that development comparing to what you've seen in the past years. And thirdly, in terms of the kind of headwinds, short answer is yes. If those headwinds start to become positive, for which I definitely believe that for this -- some of the slowliness in the B2B side will go away, at some point in time, there will be kind of normal activeness. So when those headwinds are -- and if they are kind of fading away, that will improve our results certainly. When and how they -- that will take place? I cannot say. But I believe, especially for the headwind that we see for -- in some of the B2B customers' decisions, that certainly will be ending some point in time.

There are no further questions at this time. Please go ahead, speakers.

Thank you for all participants and your questions. We wish you a very good reporting seasons. But now from our side, we wish you a nice summer time, and goodbye.

Thank you.