Metrics

MetroPCS net adds top 249K in 3Q

Phil Goldstein — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:56:05 -0400

MetroPCS released some subscriber metrics ahead of its full third quarter results. The company had gross additions of 935,000 subscribers in the quarter, up 39 percent from the third quarter of 2007. The company's net adds were 249,000 up from 114,302 in second quarter 2008, giving MetroPCS a total subscriber base of 4.8 million at the end of the third quarter.

The regional carrier increased its churn slightly in the quarter to 4.8 percent, up from 4.5 percent in the second quarter of 2008.

For more:
- see this release

Related Articles:
MetroPCS adds 671K subs in 3Q
MetroPCS adds 114K subs in Q3

The 5 Top Selling Smartphones

Phil Goldstein — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 10:28:48 -0400

This is the Year of the Smartphone.

Headlined by the global phenomenon that is the iPhone 3G, the growth in smartphones-in terms of the number of units and the proliferation of brands and styles--has been one the key trends in the wireless world this year.

ComScore M:Metrics has released its July figures for smartphone growth, and while some of the numbers are unsurprising--AT&T Mobility is the top carrier in terms of smartphone growth, largely bolstered by sales of the iPhone 3G--the snapshot provides a look into a fast-growing market. Here of some of measures in terms of year-on-year growth for the carriers and the smartphones they sold:

*Numebers are U.S. market only and reflect the three-month average ending in July. - Chart corrected

Here are the 5 top selling smartphones in the industry...

Alltel plagued by acquisition expenses

Sue Marek — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 11:02:04 -0400

Despite strong customer growth and a 10 percent increase in revenues, Alltel reported a loss of $69.9 million, due primarily to interest costs as well as depreciation and amortization expenses following the company's November 2007 merger with an affiliate of TPG Capital and GS Capital Partners. Alltel, however, is expected to be acquired by Verizon Wireless. The deal, which was announced June 5, is expected to close by year-end.

Losses aside, Alltel had a strong quarter with revenues of $2.39 billion, an increase of 10 percent over the year prior. Here's a rundown of the other metrics:

New subscribers: Alltel had total net adds of 319,687 (up from 181,494 in the prior year) and gross adds of 1 million, a 37 percent increase over the prior year. The company's total subscriber base is now 13.4 million.

ARPU: Average revenue per user was $54.42, up 1 percent from last year. Data revenue was $8.18, up 45 percent year over year.

Churn: Postpay churn was 1.21 percent and total churn was 1.92 percent.

For more:
- see this press release
- Also check out our compilation of all the second quarter metrics from the top wireless carriers here.

Related articles:
Leap and others asks FCC to deny Verizon/Alltel merger
Verizon snaps up Alltel for $28.1B

Carrier metrics: ARPU, Churn and more

Sue Marek — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 12:11:15 -0400

During the second quarter of 2008, U.S. wireless carriers kept their average revenue per user steady thanks to growing data revenues. In addition, churn levels remained low while net adds climbed (at least for some operators). Check out the top U.S. operator metrics here.

T-Mobile adds 668,000 subs, lowest number since 2006

Sue Marek — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 10:58:20 -0400

T-Mobile USA may be feeling the pinch of not having a nationwide high-speed data network. The carrier reported that it added 668,000 net new customers in the second quarter, bringing its total subscriber base to 31.5 million. However, the number of net new adds is substantially down from the first quarter, when the operator added 981,000 new customers and it's the lowest net add figure the company has had since second-quarter 2006. Technology Business Research analyst Kate Price suspects the reason for the lower net adds could be that T-Mobile is losing customers to AT&T and Verizon Wireless, which both have high-speed data networks. T-Mobile is in the process of building its UMTS data network, but so far has only commercially launched a couple markets. The company's churn also rose slightly to 1.9 percent.

Here are some other key metrics:

Revenue: Service revenues rose to $4.85 billion in the second quarter, up from $4.57 billion in first quarter and up from $4.20 billion in second quarter 2007. Total revenues were $5.47 billion.

ARPU: Average revenue per user was $52, up from $51 in first quarter and down from $53 in second quarter 2007. Prepaid ARPU was $23, up from $22 in first quarter. Data revenue was $8.60 per customer, up from $8.50 in first quarter.

Churn: Contract churn was 1.9 percent, up from 1.7 percent in first quarter. Blended churn (including contract and prepaid) was 2.7 percent in second quarter, up from 2.6 percent in first quarter. The company says that the higher churn was because the anniversary of the two-year contract was in April.

For more:
- see this press release

Related articles:
With little fanfare, T-Mobile launches 3G in New York
T-Mobile launches UMTS in Las Vegas

Verizon adds 1.5M net customers in 2Q

Sue Marek — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 11:26:11 -0400

The gloomy economic outlook appears to have little impact on Verizon Wireless--at least not yet. The wireless carrier, which reported its second quarter earnings today, added 1.5 million net new customers in the quarter bringing its total customer base to 68.7 million. This was the same amount of net new customers as the firm added in the first quarter of the year. During the firm's conference call with investors this morning, COO Denny Strigl said the company does not expect significant economic impact on its financial results in the second half of the year. Here's a breakdown of other key metrics for the quarter:

Revenue: The company's wireless service revenues were $12.1 billion, up 11.8 percent year over year. Data revenue was $2.6 billion up from $2.3 billion in first quarter 2008.

ARPU: Average revenue per user was $51.53 for the quarter, up from $50.91 in first quarter 2008. Total data ARPU was $12.58 up from $11.72 in the prior quarter.

Churn: Churn was 1.12 percent, a record low for the company. Among postpaid customers churn was 0.83 percent.

Messaging: During the quarter, Verizon customers sent or received 70 billion text messages and 1.4 billion picture messages. In addition, customers completed 36.5 million music and video downloads.

Devices: About 40.5 million Verizon customers now have 3G broadband-capable devices.

iPhone 3G: Strigl says that the firm is only seeing minimal, short-term impact from AT&T's recent introduction of the iPhone 3G.

For more:
- see this press release
- see this report

Related stories:
Verizon Wireless adds 1.5M customers
Verizon Wireless income up, buys RCC

Americans use their smartphones for Web browsing

Sue Marek — Thu, 22 May 2008 12:07:47 -0400

Research firm M:Metrics reports that U.S. smartphone users spend an average of four hours and 38 minutes per month for Web browsing. This is nearly double the Brits, who spend about two hours and 30 minutes per month Web browsing on their smartphones. M:Metrics says that the reason for the difference between the U.K. and the U.S. is that 10.9 percent of American smartphone users have an unlimited data plan compared to only 2.3 percent of U.K. users.

Top domains that U.S. smartphone users browse are Craigslist.org (1 hour and 38 minutes per month); ebay (one hour 25 minutes per month); Myspace (1 hour and 25 minutes per month); facebook.com (1 hour 24 minutes per month); and go.com (1 hour, 7 minutes per month).

For more:
- see this M:Metrics press release

Related stories:
Study: 30% of mobile workers on first smartphone. See this smartphone study.
SPOTLIGHT: Finding the smartphone sweet spot. See this smartphone study.

Carrier Metrics - ARPU, Subs, and Churn for Alltel, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, AT&T

Mike Dolan — Thu, 15 May 2008 17:05:10 -0400

Check out the latest ARPU, Net Subscribers, and Churn data for the Alltel, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon.

Click here to see the full-size charts...

Alltel releases some Q1 stats: 385K net new subs

Brian Dolan — Thu, 15 May 2008 11:43:44 -0400

While Alltel recently became a private company, the carrier still decided to release a number of key metrics for its past quarter. The company's revenues totaled $2.3 billion, which is an 11 percent increase over Q1 2007. In addition, Alltel reported a net loss of $125 million. However, those losses were mostly because of costs related to the merger, according to the carrier.

Subscribers: The carrier added 385,000 net new subscribers during the first quarter of 2008. The figure includes 163,000 net postpaid subscribers, 183,000 prepaid subscribers and 39,000 reseller net adds. The all-time high of net new subscribers marks a 63 percent increase over the same period a year ago.

ARPU: Alltel posted average revenue per user (ARPU) of $53.64, up 2 percent from last year. Data ARPU hit $7.50, which is 60 percent higher than last year.

Churn: Alltel posted a post-pay churn of 1.34 percent and total churn of 1.83 percent.

For more:
- check out our metric charts to see the latest net-subs, ARPU, and churn data of the industry's carriers
- read this Alltel Q1 press release

Verizon Wireless adds 1.5M customers

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 06:59:58 -0400

Verizon Wireless executives said this morning that the operator is weathering the strong economic uncertainty and fails to show any signs of weakness. The company reported that first quarter net adds were 1.5 million, bringing its total subscriber base to 67.2 million. That's down from 2 million net adds in fourth quarter 2007. Revenues totaled $11.7 billion, up 13.2 percent year over year.Ã‚Â Here's a breakdown of the other key metrics:Ã‚Â Ã‚Â

ARPU:Ã‚Â Retail ARPU was $51.40, up 1.3 percent year over year. However, this is slightly down from fourth quarter 2007 when the operator had an ARPU of $51.49.Ã‚Â Ã‚Â Ã‚Â

Data: Data ARPU was $11.94, up from $11.06 in fourth quarter 2007. Data now represents 23 percent of total service revenue up from 17.5 percent a year ago.Ã‚Â Data revenues were $2.3 billion. The company had 48.1 million retain data customers in March, accounting for 74 percent of the retail customer base. Ã‚Â

Churn: Total churn is 1.19 percent, down from 1.2 percent total churn in fourth quarter 2007.Ã‚Â Retail post-paid churn is 0.93 percent, down from 0.94 percent in fourth quarter. Ã‚Â

700 MHz spectrum: Verizon executives say that the company increased its spectrum inventory by 60 percent thanks to its wins in the 700 MHz spectrum auction.Ã‚Â Ã‚Â

Content: Verizon Wireless customers sent or received more than 58 billion text messages and 1.1 billion picture/video messages. Customers downloaded 34.6 million songs and videos.Ã‚Â Ã‚Â

For more,
- see this Verizon press release

Related stories:
Verizon Wireless adds 2M customers. Verizon earnings
Carrier Metrics: Churn, ARPU and subs for 2007. Wireless carrier metrics.

AT&T adds 1.3 mil subscribers in 1Q

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 06:59:58 -0400

AT&T reported its seventh consecutive quarter of wireless revenue growth. Revenue's from the telco's wireless business were up 18.3 percent year-over-year for a total of $11.8 billion. Here's a rundown of the largest U.S. operator's key metrics for first quarter:

ARPU: Average revenue per user was $50.18 up 2 percent from the year-ago quarter. Retail postpaid ARPU growth was up 5 percent.

Data: Data revenues were up 57.3 percent to $2.3 billion from the year-earlier quarter. Data now represents 21.5 percent of AT&T's total wireless revenues, up from 16 percent in first quarter 2007. During first quarter customers sent 620 million MMS messages and 44 billion SMS messages.

3G: 11 million customers now have 3G devices. The company's UMTS/HSDPA network is available in 272 metro areas.

700 MHz spectrum: AT&T executives said that based upon the company's purchase of the 700 MHz spectrum assets of Aloha Wireless and its winnings in the 700 MHz spectrum auction, AT&T will have contiguous and unencumbered spectrum that will cover 100 percent of the top 200 markets and 80 percent of the U.S. population.

iPhone: iPhone continues to be popular with AT&T customers. Executives said during this morning's call with investors that the average iPhone ARPUs are in the mid to upper $90 range. More than 40 percent of the customers that purchase an iPhone are new to AT&T.

Unlimited plans: Prior to debuting its $99/mo. unlimited rate plan about 1.5 percent of new customers would sign up for rate plans at $99/mo. or above. Now about 4 percent sign up for the $99/mo. rate plan.

For more, see AT&T's earnings release.

Related stories:
AT&T to layoff 1.5 percent of employees. See this AT&T report
AT&T: 95% of iPhone owners surf the mobile web. See this AT&T story
AT&T, T-Mobile match VZW on flat rate, sort of. Read this AT&T report

CTIA: Annual data revenues grow to $23 billion

Jason Ankeny — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 20:12:59 -0400

The U.S. wireless subscriber market now totals in excess of 255 million--roughly 84 percent of the nation's population--according to new metrics released by industry group CTIA in concert with its CTIA Wireless 2008 event in Las Vegas. According to CTIA, U.S. subscribers now consume more than 2 trillion minutes of airtime a year and send and receive more than 48 billion text messages per month. Combined data revenues now total about $23 billion a year, accounting for 17 percent of total carrier revenue. "These numbers illustrate the incredible volume of traffic carriers successfully manage every day," said CTIA president and CEO Steve Largent during Tuesday's keynote.

U.S. Cellular beefs up ARPU but net adds slow

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 06:59:56 -0500

U.S. Cellular reported that its net subscribers additions slowed down during the fourth quarter last year, but ARPU continues to climb. The carrier added 55,000 net new subscribers during the quarter for a total subscriber base of 6.1 million. The additions mark a 36 percent drop, however, from the fourth quarter in 2006. The quarter brought in 70,000 postpaid subscribers and saw the departure of 6,000 prepaid customers and 9,000 customers from resellers. U.S. Cellular's revenues increased by more than 13 percent up to $1 billion thanks to an increased ARPU of $52.46, up from $48.15 during the fourth quarter of 2006.

For more on the carrier's quarter:
- read this article from TeleGeography
- and see this table to compare U.S. Cellular's metrics to its rivals

Carrier Metrics - Churn, ARPU, Net Subscribers for 2007

Mon, 03 Mar 2008 11:07:35 -0500

Here are some key metrics from the top five carriers in the U.S.: Alltel, AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile USA and Verizon Wireless. Check out the tables below to see how these carriers performed in terms of churn, ARPU (Sprint's is postpaid only) and net subscriber additions. Private equity firms acquired Alltel last year which is why none of its metrics were released for the fourth quarter.

T-Mobile USA tops customer service study

Mon, 04 Feb 2008 06:59:56 -0500

A new user satisfaction survey by J.D. Powers & Associates ranks T-Mobile USA as the top carrier for customer service out of the five major carriers in the U.S. The survey is the seventh consecutive J.D. Powers survey that T-Mobile has won. The survey took into account customer service via telephone, retail store and Internet and include metrics like hold-time duration and the number of representatives it takes to resolve an issue.

According to the study, 47 percent of U.S. subscribers contacted their carrier for service-related issues last year. About 42 percent had billing issues, while 57 percent had inaccurate charges issues. About 73 percent of those subscribers contacted their provider via telephone and only 4 percent used the Internet.

Meanwhile, Verizon Wireless issued its own press release on user satisfaction: The carrier released a table that compares churn rates among the top four carriers. Verizon Wireless noted that for the thirteenth consecutive quarter it has has the lowest customer turnover rate. Verizon Wireless posted a 1.2 percent blended (both postpaid and prepaid) churn rate for the fourth quarter.

For more on customer satisfaction:
- read this report from MobileBurn
- check out this release from Verizon Wireless

Related:
T-Mobile's previous customer satisfaction survey win.

Verizon Wireless adds 2M customers

Mon, 28 Jan 2008 06:59:58 -0500

Verizon Wireless reported a strong fourth quarter 2007 with 2 million net customer additions, bringing its total subscriber base to 65.7 million. Of those, 63.7 million are retail customers. On the revenue front, Verizon Wireless fourth quarter revenue was $11.4 billion, a 13.3 percent increase year over year.Ã‚Â Here's a breakdown of other key metrics:

Churn: Verizon has 1.2 percent total churn, down from 1.27 percent churn in third quarter 2007. The carrier had just 0.94 percent retail post-paid churn, down from 0.96 percent postpaid churn in third quarter. Ã‚Â

ARPU:Ã‚Â Retail ARPU was $51.49, up 1.4 percent over third quarter.Ã‚Â Ã‚Â Ã‚Â

Data:Ã‚Â Total data revenue for fourth quarter was $2.1 billion. Data ARPU was $11.06, up from $10.59 in third quarter. The company had 47.2 million retail data customers in December, which is 74 percent of the retail customer base.Ã‚Â In addition, the company says that more than half of its customer base, 35 million, have a broadband-capable device.Ã‚Â Ã‚Â

Content: During fourth quarter Verizon customers sent or received nearly 45 billion text messages and 927 million picture/video messages. Customers also completed 30 million music and video downloads.Ã‚Â

During this morning's earnings call, analysts questioned the firm about what impact the current economic slowdown is having on the operator. Verizon executives said that they have not seen a change in sales expectations but they are monitoring the situation carefully. -Sue

For more on Verizon's Q4:
- check out our complete wireless, wireline, mobile content and telcoTV coverage
- also read Verizon's press release

AT&T adds 2.7M subs

Thu, 24 Jan 2008 06:59:58 -0500

The largest U.S. wireless operator reported strong subscriber and revenue growth in fourth quarter 2007. Wireless revenues totaled $11.4 billion, up 16.3 percent over the year-ago quarter. Service revenues were $10.2 billion. Here's a rundown of other key metrics:

Growth: AT&T added 2.7 million net wireless subscribers, up 13.5 percent from fourth quarter 2006. In addition, gross adds totaled 6 million, up 9.6 percent from the year-earlier fourth quarter. At year-end AT&T's total wireless subscriber base was 70.1 million.

ARPU: ARPU was up 2 percent to $50.28. AT&T said this was the sixth consecutive quarter that it has reported ARPU growth.

Data: Data revenues increased 57.5 percent over the year-ago quarter. The total data revenue is now $2 billion, up from $1.3 billion a year ago. Data now accounts for $12 of postpaid ARPU and it makes up 19.9 percent of AT&T's total wireless service revenue. During the quarter, AT&T customers sent 496 million MMS and 32 billion text messages.

iPhone: At year-end AT&T had 2 million iPhone customers on its network and 40 percent of those customers were new to AT&T. In December, the company doubled its iPhone sales as compared to sales in October and November.

TDMA: AT&T will shut down its TDMA network at the end of February. The operator moved 390,000 subscribers off the network in fourth quarter and there are about 390,000 subscribers that remain on the TDMA network. AT&T says most of those are wholesale customers. -Sue

For more on AT&T's quarter:
- read this press release

Leap's impressive Q4: adds 152K net subs

Wed, 09 Jan 2008 06:59:56 -0500

Leap Wireless added an impressive 152,000 net new customers during the fourth quarter of last year. The carrier finished out the year with some 2.86 million customers and a quarterly churn rate of 4.2 percent. The metrics beat out expectations for Leap, which said it expected additions between 70,000 and 130,000 subscribers in December and a churn rate of between 4.5 percent and 4.7 percent.

"We are pleased with the company's end-of-year performance in adding new customers and reducing churn," said CEO Doug Hutcheson. "Strong customer uptake during the conclusion of the holiday buying season helped deliver results ahead of our expectations on these two metrics, demonstrating the strength of our business as we head into the new year."

For more on Leap's better than expected Q4:
- read this press release

Related Articles:
Leap sues T-Mobile USA Article
Leap maps out partnership with Google Article
Leap changes board of directors Article
Leap rejects unsolicited proposal from MetroPCS Article

Households spend more on mobile than landlines

Tue, 18 Dec 2007 06:59:55 -0500

While the dominance of residential landline telephony services has been on the decline for some time, U.S. households have never spent more on their mobile phone services than on landline ones until this year, according to industry and government officials. Back in 2001, U.S. households spent three times as much on landline phone services than they did on mobile phone services, but last year the popularity of mobile services bridged that gap significantly. Households spent $524 on mobile phone services in 2006, while they spent about $542 during the course of the year on landline phone services. While the metrics for 2007 have yet to be compiled, analysts and government officials are confident that spending on mobile services has outstripped spending on landline telephony this past year.

"Frankly, I'd be shocked if (households) don't spend more on cell phones at this point," said Andrew Arthur, vice president of market solutions at Mediamark Research & Intelligence.

For more on the trend:
- read this article from AP

Nokia: ASPs will continue to fall

Tue, 04 Dec 2007 06:59:55 -0500

Nokia President and CEO Olli-Pekka told attendees of the company's annual investor event: "Nokia's goal is to be the world's number one in bringing the Internet to mobile devices. We estimate that in 2010, the total Internet services market will be approximately 100 billion euros." Nokia followed up on the keynote with a number of forecasted metrics:

Mobile device volumes next year will grow about 10 percent from the estimated 1.1 billion units shipped in 2007.
Mobile device volume growth next year will be above 15 percent in APAC, China and Middle East & Africa, and below 10 percent in North America, Europe and Latin America.
Industry Average Selling Prices (ASPs) for handsets will decline, because of the increasing impact of the emerging markets and competitive factors in general.
The goal of 4 billion mobile subscriptions will be reached in 2009, rather than in 2010 as previously forecasted.
Converged devices will total about 120 million units in 2007 and 180 million units in 2008.
Nokia will ship about 145 million music-enabled devices in 2007 and more than 180 million units in 2008.

For more on Nokia's investor summit:
- read this press release