MOSCOW, April 22 (RIA Novosti) - MegaFon, Russia's third largest mobile operator, said on Wednesday its U.S. GAAP net profit grew 30.5% year-on-year in 2008 to 44.32 billion rubles ($1.3 billion).

MegaFon, which was established in 2002, said its consolidated revenues in the reporting period increased 24.9% to 175.45 billion rubles ($5.2 billion), and earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) rose 22.6% to 88.12 billion rubles ($2.6 billion).

"We carefully managed our cost structure in response to slowing economic growth, which gave us the opportunity to achieve a high EBITDA result for the year and also demonstrate net profit growth of more than 30% for the year," CEO Sergei Soldatenkov said.

The number of MegaFon subscribers increased 21.9% in 2008 to 43.56 million, the mobile operator said.