AT&T reported first-quarter revenues of USD 31.8 billion, up 1.8 percent versus the year-earlier quarter. Operating profit rose to USD 6.1 billion from USD 5.8 billion, and net profit improved to USD 3.6 billion, or USD 0.60 per diluted share, from USD 3.4 billion or 57 cents a share in the year-earlier quarter. Cash from operating activities totaled USD 7.8 billion, and capital expenditure reached USD 4.3 billion.
AT&T Wireless again led the increase, with revenues up 5.4 percent year-over-year to USD 16.1 billion and operating profit advancing 11.3 percent to USD 4.4 billion. Wireless service revenues increased 4.3 percent to USD 14.6 billion, led by a 19.9 percent rise in data to USD 6.1 billion. The operator sold over 5.5 million smartphones in the three months, including 4.3 million iPhones, and 59.8 percent of postpaid customers now use the devices. With 70 percent of smartphone users now on tiered data plans, AT&T's postpaid ARPU rose 1.7 percent from a year ago to USD 64.46, led by a 15 percent increase in data ARPU. Net subscriber additions reached 726,000 in the quarter, for 103.9 million lines in service. This included postpaid net adds of 187,000, prepaid gains of 125,000, connected device net adds of 230,000 and reseller additions of 184,000.
The wireline division posted revenues down 0.8 percent to USD 14.9 billion, while operating profit rose was up 2.4 percent to USD 1.8 billion thanks to cost reductions. The drop in business revenues slowed to 0.8 percent, while residential sales were up 1.0 percent from a year earlier. The latter was driven by a 38 percent rise in revenues from U-verse, which passed 6.2 million subscribers (TV and broadband) in the quarter. U-verse TV added 200,000 subscribers to reach 4.0 million in service, and the broadband service added 718,000 subscribers to reach a total of 5.9 million, offsetting losses from DSL. Overall, AT&T added 103,000 broadband connections, while voice connections fell by 1.1 million to 37.9 million.
