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Verizon brought in $32.2 billion in second-quarter revenue, up 2.4 percent from the $31,483 it reported for the same quarter one year ago, while its net income rose 0.4 percent to $4.231 billion from $4.214 billion one year ago.
In its latest earnings report, released July 21, Verizon announced that it brought in about 1.1 million new contract prepaid wireless customers in the quarter, down 21.3 percent from the same quarter one year ago.
Diluted earnings per share came in at $1.04 in the second quarter, up 3 percent from the $1.01 per-share earnings recorded in the second quarter of 2014.
“Verizon has delivered another quarter of strong financial and operational results, based on consistent network reliability and superior value that continues to attract new customers,” Lowell McAdam, CEO and chairman, said in a statement. “In the second quarter, we again balanced quality Verizon Wireless connections growth with low churn and profitability, and we announced and completed our acquisition of AOL. We’re now poised to offer customers exciting new over-the-top (OTT) mobile video services, and we look forward to a very positive second half of 2015.”
In May, Verizon announced that it was bolstering its content and online advertising capabilities by acquiring AOL for $4.4 billion, according to an earlier eWEEK report. The acquisition, which had been rumored for months, brought together the largest U.S. mobile carrier and the AOL video and print content network, including the AOL Huffington Post Media Group. The financial results of that acquisition are not yet reflected in the company’s quarterly figures but will begin to be reported starting in the third-quarter results.
Total revenue for the company’s wireless unit reached $22.6 billion in the second quarter, up 5.3 percent from the same period in 2014.
The 1.1 new wireless customers who were added in the quarter now give Verizon Wireless about 109.5 million retail connections, up about 4.7 percent from the same period one year ago, including about 103.7 million retail postpaid connections, which is up 5.2 percent from one year ago. As part of that, Verizon added about 842,000 4G smartphones to its postpaid customer base in the second quarter of 2015. Customer 4G devices now make up about 73 percent of the company’s retail postpaid connections base.
The company also saw the addition of about 588,000 smartphones, but an offsetting decline of about 266,000 basic phones, giving it a net add of about 321,000 smartphones.
Tablet net adds totaled 852,000 in the quarter, while net prepaid devices declined by 126,000, according to the company.
Verizon officials expect a higher year-over-year growth rate in the third quarter of 2015 compared to the second quarter 2015. They also expect full-year consolidated revenue growth of at least 3 percent, excluding revenue from AOL.