T-Mobile’s focus on recruiting prepay customers instead of contract customers was the focus of its steady end-of-year financial results.
The figures, which include MVNO partner Virgin Mobile, show that its total number of subscribers increased slightly year-on-year, from 16.9m in 2006 to 17.3m in 2007.
The growth may have been tempered by T-Mobile’s decision to effectively withdraw from the Christmas contract market, which lost it 57,000 contract customers in the final quarter of last year.
T-Mobile’s contract base increased by 165,000 in 2007 to 3.9 million, but over the year as a whole net additions for contract customers dropped by 77% compared to 2006, while prepay additions were up by 27% year-on-year.
And the biggest growth in ARPU came from prepay customers, with 4.4% rise in prepay ARPU, which contributed to an overall increase in ARPU of 9.7%.
T-Mobile’s network share arrangement with 3 was picked out as the strategic highlight of the year, which T-Mobile boss Jim Hyde described as ‘pioneering’.
With non-voice revenues now accounting for 20% of T-Mobile' ARPU (up 2% points on 2006), increased 3G coverage appears to be key for the network.