France’s altnet Iliad again delivered stronger than expected profit and cash flow growth in 2009 on the back of continued strong results at the Free brand and a positive contribution from the Alice brand

These results demonstrate the continued pull of Free for the triple play customer despite intensifying competition, including from cable, making the low cost, low churn business model sustainable

By 2012, we expect fixed line profitability to increase and deliver enough cash flow to finance the launch of the Free Mobile project

Despite the recession, in 2009 the French broadband market added 1.8 million connections to reach 19.6 million, but we expect the deceleration in growth to persist in 2010

Orange’s leading position weakened further in Q4 2009, despite retail price cuts, and we expect a further decline in market share in 2010, impacting FT’s top-line

SFR was the star performer of 2009, although its Ebitda margin has improved slightly. Iliad remains the ‘best in class’ in terms of profitability, but must address high churn at Alice. Bouygues’ fixed line début was an impressive splash – at a cost

Vodafone’s European revenue growth improved by 1.4 percentage points in the December 2009 quarter to reach -3.2%, the first improvement since the start of the economic slowdown in 2008

While data revenue is growing fast in absolute terms, its contribution to growth is flat to slightly down, with the main driver being more traditional services improving due to the recovery in year-on-year GDP growth

We expect revenue growth to continue to improve as economic comparables improve, with a return to positive growth likely by the end of 2010