T-Mobile added 854,000 postpaid phone subscribers in Q3, surpassing the 739,000 estimate and beating out AT&T and Verizon
T-Mobile US missed revenue estimates for Q3 2022 at $19.48 billion; however, the carrier’s wireless service revenue and core adjusted earnings hit estimates, with the former rising 4% to $15.4 billion and the latter rising 11% to $6.7 billion after interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization. It also reported a net income of $508 million.
Further, T-Mobile US added 854,000 postpaid phone subscribers in Q3, surpassing the 739,000 estimate and beating out both AT&T, which added 708,000 subscribers and Verizon, which added just 8,000. On the earnings call, President and CEO Mike Sievert said this was the highest postpaid phone net adds for T-Mobile since the merger with Sprint.
“Our postpaid phone churn of just 0.88% improved eight basis points from last year,” he continued. “Once again, we were the only wireless service provider to improve year over year … At the end of last year, we only had a competitive network and distribution to effectively compete in 30% of those households. Today, thanks to our accelerated network build, we have already surpassed our year-end target to compete in 50% of these households, and we now expect to reach roughly 60% by the end of this year.”
T-Mobile US also topped estimates for new home and small business broadband subscribers, claiming to have added 578,000. “Our high-speed Internet attracted consumers and businesses who are new to T-Mobile at an increasing pace, establishing new relationships that we can grow with additional products and services over time,” Sievert said.
For postpaid net customer additions, T-Mobile reported 1.6 million, which is more than AT&T and Verizon combined.
The carrier also announced that is has already successfully “decommissioned substantially all targeted Sprint macro sites.” This development comes more than a year earlier than outlined in the original merger plan. “And our Ultra Capacity 5G now reaches 250 million Americans,” said Sievert. “Think about that. Today, we’re already where Verizon hopes to be more than two years from now.”
T-Mobile’s 5G Ultra Capacity network is its marketing name for its 5G network that primarily uses the 2.5 GHz spectrum it inherited from Sprint. According to a study conducted by Opensignal, T-Mobile’s Ultra Capacity 5G network has a wider reach than its competitors’ comparable “premium” 5G networks, with users able to connect to the premium service in 41.9% of counties, compared to 11.7% for Verizon and 1.4% of AT&T.
“Our goal is for T-Mobile customers to be connected anywhere in the U.S. where they can see the sky,” said Sievert.
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