요약하면
약정 - 티모빌의 승리 / 스프린트 실패
선불제 - 트랙폰의 독점 굳히기 / 티모빌의 선불시장 넘보기
곧 3위 스프린트와 4위 티모빌의 위치가 역전될 것 같습니다.
스프린트의 손 회장의 다음 전략이 어떻게 될지 기다려집니다.
The third quarter of 2014 was a pretty good one for US mobile operators. All four national carriers added subscribers:
- T-Mobile added 1.4 million postpaid, 411,000 prepaid, 333,000 MVNO and 222,000 M2M customers for a total gain of 2.3 million customers
- AT&T added 785,000 postpaid and 1,275,000 connected device subscribers but lost 140,000 prepaid customers for a total gain of 2.0 million subscribers
- Verizon added 1.52 million postpaid and 9,000 prepaid customers for a total gain of 1.53 million
- Sprint lost 272,000 postpaid customers and gained 35,000 prepaid and 827,000 wholesale customers for a total gain of 590 thousand customers
Verizon and AT&T were profitable last quarter but T-Mobile and Sprint posted loses.
- Verizon made a $3.79 billion
- AT&T reported a $3 billion profit
- T-Mobile lost $94 million
- Sprint lost $192 million
In terms of total subscribers, Verizon is still the largest and T-Mobile the smallest. But if T-Mobile continues its rapid growth it's likely to pass Sprint into third place in number of subscribers sometime this quarter. Here's how the operators ranked by total subscribers at the end of the quarter:
- Verizon 125.5 million*
- AT&T 118.65 million
- Sprint 55 million
- T-Mobile 52.9 million
*Estimated. Verizon doesn't report wholesale and M2M subscribers numbers. Verizon reported 106.2 retail connections at the end or Q3, 2014. Industry analysts estimate that Verizon has approximately 125.5 million total subscribers, including wholesale and M2M connections.
The number of prepaid customers increased after last quarter's decline. All the carriers except AT&T gained prepaid subscribers. AT&T's decline in prepaid makes me think it's having a tough time retaining the Cricket subscribers it gained when AT&T acquired Cricket earlier this year:
- T-Mobile added 411 thousand prepaid subscribers
- Verizon gained 9 thousand
- AT&T shed 140 thousand
- Sprint added 35 thousand prepaid subs
América Móvil's Tracfone subsidiary, which operates under the Straight Talk, NET10, Tracfone, Simple Mobile, Page Plus, Telcel America and SafeLink Wireless brands, and is by far the largest prepaid MVNO gained 414 thousand subscribers last quarter.
Total prepaid customers by carrier as of the end of last quarter were:
- Tracfone 25.9 million
- T-Mobile 16 million
- Sprint 14.75 million
- AT&T 11.2 million
- Verizon 6 million