Frontier Communications reported mixed third quarter results, losing both video and broadband subscribers but managing to keep customer churn flat year over year.
Frontier reported total revenues of $2.25 billion, which was in line with Wells Fargo analysts’ estimates.
The company lost 63,000 net broadband subscribers for the quarter, which was better than Wells Fargo estimates of 80,000. Frontier lost 36,000 video subscribers, including 10,000 Dish subs. Overall the company had a net loss of 99,000 consumer customers, compared to a loss of 151,000 in the second quarter of 2017. Notably, Frontier managed to keep churn flat year over year at 2.08 percent.
On an earnings call Tuesday, CFO Perley McBride said he was pleased to say Frontier accomplished $19 million in cost synergies for the quarter, and remains on track to achieve $350 million in annualized run rate cost synergies by the end of the second quarter of 2018.
McBride also said the company expects to see improvements in broadband gross adds and churn next quarter due to the company’s ongoing efforts to refine and enhance retention tactics, along with enhanced marketing efforts.
Frontier President and CEO Dan McCarthy said that while the company is heavily invested in the linear side of video, he thinks that longer term “there is a place for integration of OTT into our ecosystem for the linear.”
This could be through a partnership or an internal effort since Frontier has “all the capability” it needs and “the content and the video on-demand library to actually put together a pretty compelling, over-the-top product that we could use in our legacy markets or as an alternative for customers that just want a standalone product,” McCarthy said.
