Sprint Reports Sales of 1.5 Million iPhones, 40% to New Customers

Sprint has reported its earnings for the third quarter revealing sales of 1.5 million iPhones.

Sprint Nextel today reported wireless service revenues of nearly $7.3 billion during the quarter, an increase of nearly 6 percent year-over-year. Wireless service revenues for the Sprint platform grew 14 percent year-over-year driven by postpaid ARPU growth of $3.01 and continued subscriber growth.

The company reported a net loss of $767 million and a diluted net loss of $.26 per share for the third quarter of 2012 as compared to a net loss of $301 million and a diluted net loss of $.10 per share in the third quarter of 2011. Sprint’s third quarter 2012 results include accelerated depreciation of $397 million, or negative $.13 per share (pre-tax), primarily related to Network Vision, including the expected shutdown of the Nextel platform.


Sprint reported approximately 1.5 million iPhone sales in the third quarter with 40 percent representing new customers. The company also surpassed 1 million LTE smartphones sold prior to the launch of iPhone 5.

Net subsidy in the third quarter was approximately $1.6 billion (equipment revenue of $750 million, less cost of products of $2.4 billion), compared to approximately $1.2 billion in the year-ago period and approximately $1.5 billion in the second quarter of 2012. The quarterly year-over-year increase in net subsidy is primarily due to the launch of iPhone and 4G LTE devices, which on average carry a higher subsidy rate per handset as compared to other handsets. The sequential increase in net subsidy is primarily due to higher postpaid and prepaid handset sales and the launch of 4G devices on the prepaid Sprint platform, which on average carry a higher subsidy rate per handset as compared to other handsets.

Sales expenses increased year-over-year primarily due to iPhone point-of-sale discounts (subsidy) for devices directly sold by the manufacturer to indirect dealers in which Sprint does not take device title.

The company recently announced new tablet rate plans.


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