T-Mobile USA had a very busy third quarter--the carrier expanded its 3G UMTS coverage and launched the G1, the first phone running on Google's Android platform. The operator reported a net income of $442 million, down 16 percent from $526 million in the third quarter last year. Service revenue was $4.91 billion, up from $4.33 billion in the third quarter last year, and total revenue was $5.51 billion, up from $4.89 billion in the third quarter of 2007. Here is a rundown of other key metrics for the quarter:
Net adds: The carrier had 670,000 net subscriber additions in the quarter, up from 668,000 in the second quarter, but down from 857,000 in the third quarter of 2007. The company blamed the drop on contract churn.The company reported prepaid net additions of 377,000, up from 143,000 in the second quarter 2008 and 300,000 in the third quarter of 2007.
Churn: Contract churn was 2.4 percent for the quarter, up from 1.9 percent in the second quarter of 2008 and 2 percent in the third quarter of 2007. T-Mobile said that the anniversary of two-year contracts, along with competition from other incumbents was part of the reason for the increase.
ARPU: Blended ARPU was $52, down from $53 in the third quarter of last year. Contract, or postpaid ARPU was $55, down from $57 in the year-ago quarter.
Data revenue: Data services revenue for the quarter was $850 million. Data accounted for 17.3 percent of blended ARPU, or $8.90 per customer, up from 15.4 percent of blended ARPU, or $8.10 per customer in the third quarter of 2007.
Expanded coverage and G1 launch: During the quarter the carrier expanded its UMTS footprint and plans to have UMTS available in 120 cities by the end of November. The carrier also launched the G1, which it hopes will be a top rival to Apple's iPhone 3G during the holiday shopping season. Kate Price, an analyst for Technology Business Research, said, "TBR believes the significant increase in T-Mobile USA's postpaid churn in 3Q08 is due in part to competitive pressure from the 3G iPhone, which was launched on AT&T's network in July. AT&T indicated it saw 1 million customers switch to AT&T due to the iPhone, and it appears many of those customers may have come from T-Mobile. Though T-Mobile launched the G1 device on its network in September, the company did not previously have a handset that was competitive with the iPhone."
For more:
- see this release
[1]- see this analyst release
[2]Related Articles:
T-Mobile [3] adds 668,000 subs, lowest number since 2006
T-Mobile [4] will have 3G in 27 markets by year's end
[2]
Links:
[1] http://www.fiercewireless.com/press-releases/t-mobile-usa-reports-third-quarter-2008-results
[2] http://www.fiercewireless.com/press-releases/t-mobile-usa-posts-lowest-postpaid-subscriber-additions-companys-history
[3] http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/t-mobile-adds-668-000-subs-lowest-number-2006/2008-08-07
[4] http://www.fiercebroadbandwireless.com/story/t-mobile-will-have-3g-27-major-markets-end-08/2008-09-21