Telephone and Data Systems Inc. (TDS) reported its third-quarter results on Friday, turning around a loss in the same quarter last year to post a net income of $51.1 million and an earnings per share (EPS) of $0.46 cents on revenues of $1.37 billion.
The company’s wireless business U.S. Cellular brought in nearly $1.1 billion in revenues and an EPS of $0.75 cents for the third quarter.
“Our businesses showed continued success in the quarter, in an ever-changing and highly competitive environment,” said TDS president and CEO LeRoy T. Carlson Jr. “U.S. Cellular and TDS Telecom made significant investments in their networks and continued to enhance their systems, to elevate their competitive positioning and to build even stronger customer loyalty.
According to Carlson, U.S. Cellular’s customer base continued to grow for the fifth straight quarter thanks to strong sales of connected devices and low churn. The third quarter also saw the completion of U.S. Cellular’s 4G LTE rollout, which U.S. Cellular president and CEO Kenneth Meyers said will allow the company to provide the benefits of its data network to more customers, including those in very rural areas.
“This was one of our major priorities for the year,” Meyers said. “The results of this customer focus manifests itself in high customer loyalty and lower churn.”
U.S. Cellular also discontinued its loyalty rewards program in the third quarter, with deferred revenue from unredeemed points amounting to $58.2 million in service revenues.
Going forward, Meyers said the company plans to capitalize on its suite of 4G services over the holiday season to grow the carrier’s customer base and increase revenue through competitive pricing and promotions.
Estimates for U.S. Cellular’s full year 2015 operating revenues remained around $4 billion, though estimates for operating cash flow and adjusted EBITDA both increased.
Carlson said TDS’ other business, TDS Telecom, continued the roll out of fiber deployments to enable IPTV in more wireline markets in the third quarter, resulting in an increase in residential revenue per customer.