Deutsche Telekom has reported €100 billion of revenue for the first time in its 2020 financial results, driven by the takeover of competitor Sprint in the United States.

“Net revenue increased by 25.4 percent to 101.0 billion euros,” said Deutsche Telekom.

“This significant growth was mainly driven by the takeover of the competitor Sprint in the United States.”

This is the highest ever annual revenue for a European telecoms company.

Adjusted net profit rose 15.5% to €5.7 billion.

“With almost 17 billion euros, Deutsche Telekom invested nearly 30 percent more in terms of cash capex than in the prior year, with most of it going into networks on both sides of the Atlantic,” said the company.

Deutsche Telekom CEO Tim Höttges said: “We made history in 2020. We added a substantial and important chapter to Deutsche Telekom’s story.

“We closed a groundbreaking deal in the United States, improved our market position in Europe and at the same time made an important contribution to managing the impact of the coronavirus pandemic with our stable networks.”

On its Germany operations, the company said: “Telekom closed 2020 with another very strong quarter in the broadband business.

“Between October and December, the company won 121,000 new broadband customers, the highest figure recorded for many years.

“At the end of the year, Telekom reported 14.1 million broadband customers, 388,000 more than a year earlier.

“MagentaEINS, the product package combining fixed-network and mobile communications, passed the 5 million customer mark in the fourth quarter.

“The product has proven to be successful in terms of both revenue development and reducing churn.

“Mobile service revenues were again impacted by the pandemic-induced travel restrictions in the fourth quarter of 2020.

“Decreases in roaming and visitor revenues resulted in a 1.7 percent decline in service revenues compared with the prior year.

“Adjusted for the coronavirus effect, there was an increase of 1.1 percent.

“Telekom recorded 206,000 in branded customer additions.

“That was more than twice as many as in the fourth quarter of 2019, when there was growth of 97,000.”

On its United States business, Deutsche Telekom said: “T-Mobile US recorded 1.7 million net customer additions in the fourth quarter.

“Of these, 824,000 were attributable to the lucrative postpaid phone customer segment.

“As of the year-end, the customer base totaled 102 million.

“This was up 50 percent against the end of 2019, driven primarily by the takeover of Sprint as of April 1, 2020.

“The Sprint transaction also had an impact on the financial figures.

“In 2020, total revenue increased by 55 percent to 70.1 billion U.S. dollars.

“Adjusted EBITDA AL recorded an even greater increase of 92.8 percent to 24.0 billion U.S. dollars.

“Already in 2020, T-Mobile realized synergies of 1.3 billion U.S. dollars from the takeover of Sprint.

“A quarter of the voice and data traffic of former Sprint postpaid customers has already been moved to the T-Mobile network.”