Cingular Wireless, posted strong Q2 results driven by continued subscriber growth, improvement in margins and postpaid churn, and strength in data and enterprise services. Some highlights of Q2:
- net subscriber additions were 1.1 million, nearly all of which were postpaid. Second-quarter postpaid net additions were comparable to the number delivered in the first quarter of 2005, and represent the third straight quarter of more than 1 million postpaid net additions.
- Gross additions were 4.4 million. Postpaid churn improved sequentially to 1.8 percent -- a record low for the company.
- At the end of Q2, 90% of the company's total combined minutes were carried on its GSM network. Seventy-eight percent of Cingular's subscriber base was GSM-equipped by the end of the second quarter, up from 72 percent in the first quarter of 2005. More than 7 percent of Cingular's customer base upgraded handsets during the second quarter --almost entirely onto GSM.
- Q2 revenues were $8.6 billion, which is an improvement of 5.4 percent over pro forma revenue of $8.2 billion during the year-ago second quarter and up 4.6 percent versus the first quarter of this year.
- ARPU was $50.43, up 1.7 percent from $49.59 in the first quarter of this year but down 5.6 percent from pro forma ARPU in the year-ago second quarter.
- ARPU from data services increased more than 12 percent to $4.16 compared to $3.70 in the first quarter of this year.
- Cingular delivered 5 billion text messages during the quarter.
- The company said it remains on track to launch UMTS/HSDPA in 15-20 markets by the end of 2005.
