what is a revenue generating unit rgu 
a revenue generating unit rgu is an individual service subscriber who generates recurring revenue for a company this is used as a performance measure for management analysts and investors rgus are tracked by telecom companies cable companies and other businesses that have a base of subscribers for a service rgu growth can occur organically or through acquisitions understanding revenue generating units rgus revenue generating units rgus are subscribers either individuals or businesses but most commonly applied to individuals who pay for monthly services such as mobile phones internet streaming services or cable tv rgus as a term has become interchangeable with customer relationships customers or simply subscribers where users are the units in question whatever a company decides to name them it compiles this data segments and analyzes rgu figures are often used to calculate average revenue per unit user arpu another key metric for the telecom and cable industries a company is interested in net additions to rgus it will analyze where rgus were added geographically and in which product lines the company will attempt to attribute these gains in subscribers to a particular marketing campaign or change in the competitive landscape similarly if there were rgu losses it would try to determine the reasons and take steps to address the attrition finding rgu dataliberty global group is a good example of a company that breaks down its rgu data its quarterly 10 q and annual 10 k filings contain rgu tables that segment cable service type voice video data mobile service type prepaid postpaid and by countries where the company operates net additions or losses of rgus are then discussed in the company s md a or management discussion and analysis 1average revenue per unit arpu the average revenue per unit is equivalent to total revenue divided by average units or users during a period the period end date is not the measure date for the denominator because the number of units can fluctuate intra period instead the beginning of the period and the end of the period numbers are typically averaged however the number of units or users may not remain constant throughout the standard time period it can vary somewhat from day to day as new users appear or old users cease to take advantage of a service therefore the number of units for a given period must be estimated in order to give the most accurate arpu figure possible for that period in order to accurately calculate arpu one must first define a standard time period most telephone and communications carriers for example calculate arpu on a month to month basis the total revenue generated during the standard time period should then be divided by the number of units or users 