The U.S. wireless race has already winnowed to AT&T and Verizon, which went head-to-head on metrics. Verizon added substantially more subscribers in the quarter thanks to the iPhone, but AT&T's bottom line wasn't hurt because of it. Even Sprint Corp. (NYSE: S) held its own thanks to its prepaid business, but the carrier has been telling everyone who'll listen that it's going to get harder for them if AT&T absorbs T-Mobile. (See AT&T Takes the Oath on T-Mobile Merger).
All of the operators, including the smaller players, talked up mobile Internet growth, driven by the adoption of smartphones, particularly Android-based phones, in most cases .
Here's a snapshot of how the top eight operators fared in the first quarter:
Table 1: Tier 1 Wireless Operators' Q1 Earnings
Verizon Wireless | AT&T | Sprint | T-Mobile | |
Total Revenue | $27.0 billion | $31.2�billion | $8.3 billion | $5.16 billion |
Total Subscribers | 104 million | 97.5 million | 51 million | 33.6 million |
Postpaid Subscriber Additions | 906,000 | 165,000 | -114,000 | -471,000 |
Postpaid ARPU | $53.52 | $63.39 | $56 | $52 |
Total Postpaid Churn | 1.01 percent | 1.18 percent | 1.81 percent | 2.4 percent |
Source: VZW, AT&T, Sprint & Deutsche Telekom |
Table 2: Tier 2 Operators' Q1 Earnings
Clearwire | US Cellular | MetroPCS | Leap Wireless | |
Total Revenue | $242 million | $985.1 million | $1.2 billion | $779.9 million |
Total Subscribers | 6.15 million | 6.1 million | 8.9 million | 5.8 million |
Postpaid Subscriber Additions | 1.8 million | Lost 22,000 | 725,000 (prepaid) | 331,000 (prepaid) |
Postpaid ARPU | $46.32 (retail) | $51.21 | $40.42 (prepaid) | $39.35 (prepaid) |
Total Postpaid Churn | 3.3 percent (retail) | 1.37 percent | 3.1 percent (prepaid) | 3.1 percent (prepaid) |
Source: Clearwire, US Cellular, MetroPCS & Leap Wireless |
For more of LR Mobile's first-quarter analysis:
- U.S. Cellular Reports Q1
- Deutsche Telekom Shrinks in Q1
- T-Mobile Suffers in Competitive US Wireless Biz
- Leap Hopes Music Will Muve It Nationwide
- Leap Makes Gains But Reports Q1 Loss
- Clearwire Posts Q1 Loss
- Clearwire Says It Won't Sell Spectrum
- MetroPCS Seeks 'LTE for All' Spectrum
- Sprint Perks Up in Competitive Q1
- AT&T Looks From iPhone to LTE to Increase Subs
- AT&T's iPhone Growth Continues
— Sarah Reedy, Senior Reporter, Light Reading Mobile
A reader made a good point that looking at overall revenues can be misleading. We did that for consistency, but the other metrics are worth looking at too. For example, AT&T reported total revenues of $32.1 billion, but wireless revenues were $15.3 billion, which doesn't trample Sprint and T-Mobile when adjusted for their subscriber numbers. Connected devices also change the subscriber addition numbers, but postpaid subscribers (people) will always be the most valuable.