Sprint announced that its operating revenue fell to $8.13 billion in Q1 2018-19 from $8.16 billion a year earlier.
Sprint, a telecom operator owned by SoftBank of Japan, has added 87,000 new wireless subscribers who pay a monthly bill during the first quarter.
The fourth-largest U.S. wireless carrier has reported sequential growth in wireless service revenue for the first time in more than four years due to sequential growth in post-paid and pre-paid ARPU.
Overland Park, Kansas-based company said post-paid ARPU grew sequentially for the first time in nearly five years. Post-paid service revenue grew sequentially for first time in more than four years. Prepaid service revenue grew both sequentially and year-over-year.
Sprint said it plans to offer the best digital customer experience, including using artificial intelligence (AI) to improve customer care interactions, utilizing analytics to identify customer issues, and boosting the mix of sales in digital channels.
Sprint said post-paid phone gross additions in digital channels grew more than 50 percent year-over-year in the quarter and the mix of gross additions in digital channels was also up year-over-year.
Sprint CEO Michel Combes said during the conference call with analysts that higher prices for new unlimited wireless plans could affect customer additions as the company tries to balance growth and profitability.
While Sprint has the best price for an unlimited plan in the industry, “these pricing changes could pressure growth ads as they are less promotional than previous offers,” Combes said.
Still, Combes said he expected Sprint to have positive customer additions on a net basis for the year.
Net income of Sprint fell to $176 million, or 4 cents per share, in the three months ended June 30, compared with $206 million, or 5 cents per share, a year earlier.
Churn, or the rate of customer defections, was 1.55 percent during the quarter, up from 1.5 percent a year earlier.
Sprint’s average revenue per phone subscriber was $49.57 during the quarter, down from $53.92 a year earlier.
Sprint investment
In a bid to become the first company to bring 5G technology to major U.S. cities, Sprint has been targeting a first half 2019 launch in at least eight cities, including New York City and Kansas City.
Sprint said it completed thousands of tri-band upgrades and has 2.5 GHz spectrum deployed on nearly two-thirds of its macro sites.
Sprint added thousands of new outdoor small cells and currently has more than 15,000 deployed including both mini-macros and strand mounts.
Sprint distributed more than 65,000 Sprint Magic Boxes, bringing the total to more than 260,000 nationwide.
