AT&T
posted consolidated revenues of $31.5 billion for the quarter ended
September 30, 2011, down $103 million, or 0.3 percent, versus the year-earlier
quarter.
AT&T’s
third-quarter 2011 net income was $3.6 billion as compared to
$12.3 billion in the third quarter of 2010.
Third-quarter
2011 cash from operating activities was $10.4 billion, and capital
expenditures totaled $5.3 billion.
Compared
with results for the first nine months of 2010, year to date through the third
quarter, cash from operating activities totaled $27.2 billion versus
$25.4 billion; capital expenditures totaled $14.7 billion compared to
$13.7 billion; and free cash flow totaled $12.4 billion versus
$11.6 billion.
‘Mobile
broadband growth continues to be robust, execution was strong across the
business, and we delivered another solid quarter,’ said Randall Stephenson,
chairman and chief executive officer of AT&T.
“Smartphones,
connected devices and tablets all posted impressive gains. Our first LTE 4G
markets are up and running with terrific speeds. And we continue to work toward
a successful completion of our planned T-Mobile USA merger. The next waves in
the mobile Internet revolution represent tremendous growth potential, and we
are laying the groundwork required for that future,” Stephenson added.
Led
by continued strong performance in mobile broadband in the third quarter,
AT&T continued to grow revenues, add subscribers, increase postpaid ARPU
and expand margins.
AT&T
posted a net gain in total wireless subscribers of 2.1 million, to reach
100.7 million in service. Net adds for the quarter include postpaid net
adds of 319,000. Excluding the impacts of the Alltel and Centennial integration
migrations, postpaid net adds were approximately 384,000.
Prepaid
net adds were 293,000, connected device net adds were 1,038,000 and reseller
net adds were 473,000. Third-quarter net adds reflect adoption of smartphones,
increases in prepaid and reseller subscribers and sales of tablets and
connected devices such as automobile monitoring systems, security systems and a
host of other emerging products.
AT&T
added 505,000 of devices to reach 4.5 million, an almost 80 percent
increase from a year ago. Most of those new subscribers were tablets, with
290,000 added in the quarter, of which more than 35 percent were postpaid.
Total
churn declined to 1.28 percent versus 1.32 percent in the third
quarter of 2010 and 1.43 percent in the second quarter of 2011. Postpaid
churn was 1.15 percent, compared to 1.14 percent in the year-ago
third quarter and 1.15 percent in the second quarter of 2011. Excluding
the impacts of the Alltel and Centennial migrations, postpaid churn of
1.11 percent for the quarter was unchanged versus the year-ago quarter.
In
the third quarter, the company sold 4.8 million smartphones, representing
nearly two-thirds of postpaid device sales. Sales of Android devices more than
doubled year over year, and almost half of all smartphone sales were non-iPhone
devices. During the quarter, 2.7 million iPhones were activated.
The
average ARPU for smartphones on AT&T’s network is 1.9 times that of
the company’s non-smartphone devices. More than 85 percent of smartphone
subscribers are on FamilyTalk or business plans.
Churn
levels for these subscribers are significantly lower than for other postpaid
subscribers. The number of subscribers on tiered-data plans continues to
increase. About 18 million, or nearly half, of all smartphone subscribers are
on tiered-data plans.
Total
wireless revenues, which include equipment sales, were up 2.8 percent year
over year to $15.6 billion. Wireless service revenues increased
4.3 percent, to $14.3 billion, in the third quarter.
Wireless
data revenues driven by Internet access, access to applications, messaging and
related services increased by $857 million from the year-earlier quarter to
$5.6 billion. AT&T’s postpaid wireless subscribers on monthly data
plans increased by 16.5 percent over the past year.
Versus
the year-earlier quarter, total text messages carried on the AT&T network
increased by 22 percent to 196.3 billion, and multimedia messages
increased by 54 percent to 4.3 billion.
Driven
by strong data growth, postpaid subscriber ARPU increased 1.4 percent
versus the year-earlier quarter to $63.69. This marked the 11th
consecutive quarter AT&T has posted a year-over-year increase in postpaid
ARPU. Postpaid data ARPU reached $25.14, up 14.2 percent versus the
year-earlier quarter.
Third-quarter
wireless margins reflect strong smartphone sales, solid customer upgrade levels
and some residual Alltel and Centennial merger costs. This was offset in part
by improved operating efficiencies and further revenue gains from the company’s
growing base of high-quality smartphone subscribers. Year-over-year comparisons
are also influenced by the launch of iPhone 4 at the end of the second quarter
a year ago.
Driven
by strength in IP data services, revenues from residential customers totaled
$5.3 billion, an increase of 0.2 percent versus the third quarter a year
ago, the fifth consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth.
AT&T
U-verse TV added 176,000 subscribers to reach 3.6 million in service. In
the third quarter, the AT&T U-verse High Speed Internet attach rate was
90 percent and about half of new subscribers took AT&T U-verse Voice.
Three-fourths of AT&T U-verse TV subscribers have a triple- or quad-play option
from AT&T. ARPU for U-verse triple-play customers was almost $170, up
5.7 percent year over year.
AT&T’s
U-verse deployment now reaches almost 30 million living units. Companywide
penetration of eligible living units is 15.7 percent, and
24.8 percent across areas marketed to for 36 months or more. AT&T’s
total video subscribers, which combine the company’s U-verse and bundled
satellite customers, reached 5.4 million at the end of the quarter,
representing 22.6 percent of households served.
AT&T
U-verse High Speed Internet delivered a third-quarter gain of 504,000
subscribers to reach a total of 4.6 million, helping offset losses from DSL.
Overall, AT&T posted a slight net gain in wireline broadband connections.
More than 70 percent of consumers have a broadband plan of 3 Mbps or higher.
AT&T
U-verse Voice connections increased by 119,000 in the quarter and 648,000 over
the past four quarters. Total consumer revenue connections at the end of the
third quarter were 41.9 million, compared with 43.7 million at the
end of the third quarter of 2010 and 42.5 million at the end of the second
quarter of 2011.
Total
business revenues were $9.3 billion, an increase of 0.7 percent
sequentially and down 2.7 percent versus the year-earlier quarter. The
year-over-year decline reflects economic weakness in voice and legacy data
products somewhat offset by growth in IP data. Excluding the effect of the
third-quarter 2010 sale of Japan assets, business service revenues, which
exclude CPE, declined 1.7 percent year over year, compared to a
year-over-year decline of 3.4 percent in the year-ago quarter.
Total
business IP data revenues grew 10.2 percent versus the year-earlier third
quarter, led by growth in VPN revenues. IP-based solutions allow customers to
easily add managed services such as network security, cloud services and IP
conferencing on top of their infrastructures. Total business data revenues grew
1.8 percent year over year.
Third-quarter
total wireline revenues were $15.0 billion, down 2.2 percent versus the
year-earlier quarter but up slightly sequentially. Third-quarter wireline
operating expenses were $13.2 billion, down 1.3 percent versus the
third quarter of 2010 and up 1.3 percent sequentially. Wireline operating
income totaled $1.8 billion, down from $2.0 billion in the third
quarter of 2010 and down versus the second quarter of 2011.
By
Telecomlead.com Team
editor@telecomlead.com
