AT&T posted positive third quarter earnings and boasted 363,000 new customers.
That means a net income of $3.8 billion with adjusted earnings revenue of $32.2 billion for the nation's second largest mobile provider. AT&T is touting record results for both its smartphone and U-verse units.
While T-Mobile's current discount offerings bagged them 685,000 new subscribers in the last quarter, AT&T added 363,000 new contracts. The rate at which customers leave and join is also down. During the quarter, AT&T sold 6.7 million smartphones. Like rival Verizon, AT&T plans new wireless contract plans that bill subscribers for the full price of their phone by breaking the purchase into monthly payments. It means a faster device upgrade for customers.
Earlier this week, AT&T said it would sell the long-term rights to manage a portfolio of cell-phone towers to Crown Castle International Corp for $4.85 billion in cash. The company also plans on closing the deal of acquiring prepaid carrier Leap Wireless for $1.2 billion.
U-Verse is the company's fastest growing part of the business as it added 265,000 of the TV service, giving the company's department the best quarter in almost five years. Users of its high speed internet subscribers in the third-quarter grew by 655,000.
Randall L. Stephenson, Chairman and CEO was satisfied by the results.
"We're setting the standard for 4G LTE speeds and network reliability," said Stephenson. "Our fiber and U-verse expansion projects are ahead of schedule bringing high-speed broadband to millions more customers. With these initiatives, we're seeing excellent growth across our major platforms - mobility, U-verse and strategic business services."
Business customers total revenue declined by approximately 2.6 percent on an annual basis of $8.8 billion, however. Trying to put a positive spin on things, AT&T declared legacy product declines were at least offset by growth in strategic business services. Growing 15.7 percent and representing $8.6 billion in annualized revenue, that included VPN, Ethernet, hosting and other IP services.
