As part of a significant restructuring exercise, Telefonica has disclosed plans to align the activities of its Telefonica Digital unit more closely with its core strategy, a move that will see the brand disappear from the market.


"We have witnessed a real explosion in data traffic over both fixed and mobile lines," said Telefonica CEO César Alierta on Wednesday, who noted that the data growth seen in recent years will "pale into insignificance" compared to what lies ahead for the industry.


For that reason, Telefonica is focusing its strategy on four areas: growing revenue from commercial digital services; modernising networks by rolling out LTE and fibre; increasing efficiency through cost savings; and finally, strengthening its position in what it calls the "digital ecosystem".


To achieve this refocusing, the Spanish incumbent said it will absorb Telefonica Digital, along with Telefonica Europe and Telefonica LatAm (excluding Brazil) into the group's Global Corporate Centre in a bid to simplify its organisation.


Telefonica's director of strategy and alliances Eduardo Navarro will take on the new role of chief commercial digital officer, and will report to COO José María Álvarez-Pallete López. He will be responsible for creating new business opportunities and growing revenues from the group's digital assets.


Until now, that role has been carried out by Telefonica Digital, which has been run from the U.K. by Matthew Key. He will stay on as a director of Telefonica UK, but will not be heading up the group's newly-centralised digital activities.


Key is not the only senior exec affected by the restructure.


Santiago Fernández Valbuena, who as head of Telefonica LatAm has made the division the single biggest contributor to group revenue, has been named chief strategy officer. Meanwhile Eva Castillo, head of Telefonica Europe, will retain her seat on the board and the presidency of Telefonica Germany's supervisory board.


Meanwhile, Telefonica on Thursday published its fourth-quarter and full-year 2013 numbers.


For the three months ended 31 December, the company reported revenue fell 8.9% to €14.4 billion. Full-year revenue came in at €57.1 billion, down 8.5% from 2012. However, net income in 2013 grew by 16.9% to €4.6 billion.


For the year ahead, Telefonica said it expects positive revenue growth, and capex-to-sales ratio of 15.5%-16%.


"Among our targets, we will continue accelerating revenue growth and, at the same time, we will increase investments to anticipate to the growing demand from the increasingly intensive data service usage," said Alierta, in a statement.