Sprint Has Best Quarter In 5 Years From A Customer Add Standpoint

It has been a very, very long time since Sprint has had a tremendous amount of great news to report in a quarterly earnings statement. In fact, this most previous quarter is the company's best in five years when looking at customer gains. For years now, Sprint has been shedding customers left and right, with many fleeing to AT&T for the iPhone and others bolting to Verizon for their deep selection of Android phones.

All told, the company added nearly 1.1 million total wireless subscribers (including net postpaid subscriber additions) in Q4 2010, and they also achieved their highest-ever fourth quarter prepaid net subscriber additions. It was the company's best Q4 ever in term of annual postpaid churn results, and it marked the 12th quarter in a row of improvement in first-call resolution from a customer service standpoint.

The ended the year with free cash flow of $913 million, and they had net postpaid subscriber additions of 58,000, which include net subscriber additions of 519,000 for the Sprint brand. It's quite possible that Sprint's recent decision to really push their WiMAX / 4G services (not to mention grabbing high-end phones like the HTC EVO 4G) have helped them. They're the carrier people think of when people think of 4G, but those specific 3G vs. 4G numbers aren't broken out.

Despite an amazing quarter, Sprint has a long road ahead. Other carriers are getting into 4G, and Verizon both lit up an LTE network and got the iPhone this month. Talk about tough competition.

Sprint Nextel Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2010 Results

Added nearly 1.1 million total wireless subscribers including net postpaid subscriber additions – both bests in nearly five years – and highest ever fourth quarter prepaid net subscriber additions

    * Best ever fourth quarter and annual postpaid churn results
    * Twelfth consecutive quarter of improvement in Customer Care Satisfaction and First Call Resolution
    * Sequential and year-over-year total quarterly net operating revenue growth
    * Free Cash Flow* of $913 million in the fourth quarter and $2.5 billion for 2010

The company’s fourth quarter and full year 2010 earnings conference call will be held at 8 a.m. EST today. Participants may dial 800-938-1120 in the U.S. or Canada (706-634-7849 internationally) and provide the following ID: 38599868, or may listen via the Internet at www.sprint.com/investor.

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (BUSINESS WIRE), February 10, 2011 - Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) today reported that during the fourth quarter of 2010, the company achieved its best total company wireless subscriber additions and net postpaid additions since the first and second quarters of 2006, respectively. The company added nearly 1.1 million total wireless subscribers driven by net postpaid subscriber additions of 58,000, which include net subscriber additions of 519,000 for the Sprint brand - and the company’s best ever fourth quarter prepaid net subscriber additions of 646,000. The company delivered postpaid churn of 1.86 percent - the best postpaid churn result Sprint has reported in the fourth quarter of any year. Sprint achieved its best ever annual postpaid churn of 1.95 percent in 2010.

Sprint generated $913 million of Free Cash Flow* in the quarter, and $2.5 billion for full year 2010. As of December 31, 2010, the company had nearly $5.5 billion in cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments. Sprint reported fourth quarter consolidated net operating revenues of approximately $8.3 billion, which is a 6 percent increase from the same quarter a year ago, and an operating loss of $139 million, a 74 percent improvement from the year ago period. The company also reported a net loss of $929 million and a diluted loss per share of 31 cents for the quarter. Full year 2010 results included consolidated net operating revenues of $32.6 billion, an operating loss of $595 million, which is a 57 percent improvement compared to 2009, and a diluted loss per share of $1.16.

“I am pleased with the progress Sprint made in 2010 in each of our three focus areas. Sprint’s customer experience and brand continued to strengthen during the year, and we generated excellent cash flow,” said Dan Hesse, Sprint CEO. “It had been almost five years since we added over a million customers in a quarter, and the annual improvement in postpaid subscriber results of 2.7 million vs. the previous year is unprecedented in the history of the U.S. wireless industry.”