Despite having recorded a 4.5% loss in subscribers in the quarter to the end of March 2018, Algerian mobile firm Djezzy did increase the number of its data subscribers as well as the volume of minutes on its voice telephony services.

That is according to parent company Veon which added that while increased competition within the country's mobile telecommunications industry has impacted on Djezzy, it did record 85% data usage and 1.065Mb per user.

Its total number of subscribers stood at 15.3 million and the company also experienced an increase of 1.8% in data subscribers (quarter-on-quarter) with voice growing by 19.8%.

Trond Westlie, Chief Finance Officer for Veon, expects a turnaround at the beleaguered unit by year-end.

"The company's performance in Algeria and Bangladesh remains under pressure, but there is an indication that our turnaround plans for these markets are on track and are likely to show operational improvements towards the back end of the financial year," he said.

Despite the data surge, total revenue for Djezzy declined by 9.3% compared to the previous contrasting period. Revenues for the quarter period amounted to US$198.5 million.

"Price competition, in both voice and data, caused a continued reduction in ARPU and a year-on-year increase in churn. Data revenue growth was 79.7%, due to higher usage and a substantial increase in data customers as a result of the 3G and 4G/LTE network roll-out," read a statement issued by the company.

The positive data usage trend is "supported by the change towards a more aggressive data pricing strategy, through the launch of new offers which improved Djezzy's share of gross adds and reversed the trend of net adds" from negative to positive during the period under review.

According to Djezzy its 4G/LTE service covers over 25.3% of the country's population, while its 3G network covers over 75%.