Comcast reported a strong quarter for its cable communications business with revenue increasing 4.2% to $14.3 billion in the first quarter of 2019, driven primarily by increases in high-speed internet and business services revenue. High-speed internet revenue increased 10.1%, driven by an increase in the number of residential high-speed internet customers and rate adjustments. Business services revenue increased 9.5%, due to an increase in the number of customers and rate adjustments.
Cable Communications’ capital expenditures decreased 19.4% to $1.4 billion in the first quarter of 2019, reflecting a lower level of spending on customer premise equipment and scalable infrastructure. Cable capital expenditures represented 9.5% of Cable revenue in the first quarter of 2019 compared to 12.3% in last year’s first quarter.
Other highlights:
- Total high-speed internet customer net additions were 375,000, total video customer net losses were 121,000, total voice customer net losses were 53,000 and total security and automation customer net additions were 17,000.
- The company added 170,000 wireless lines in the quarter.
- Wireless revenue increased 21.4%, reflecting an increase in the number of customer lines, partially offset by lower device sales as more customers bring their own device.
- Other revenue increased 7.0%, primarily driven by increases in revenue from X1 licensing agreements and our security and automation services.
- Video revenue decreased 0.5%, due to a decline in the number of residential customers, partially offset by rate adjustments.
- Advertising revenue decreased 4.5%, primarily due to a decline in political advertising revenue. Voice revenue decreased 1.6%, reflecting a decrease in the number of residential voice customers.
- Total Customer Relationships increased by 300,000 to 30.7 million in the first quarter of 2019.
- Residential customer relationships increased by 276,000 and business customer relationships increased by 25,000.
- At the end of the first quarter, 67.3% of residential customers received at least two Xfinity products.
- Adjusted EBITDA for Comcast’s Cable Communications increased 9.8% to $5.7 billion in the f
- First quarter of 2019, reflecting higher revenue, partially offset by a 0.8% increase in operating expenses.
- Video programming costs increased 2.8%, primarily reflecting higher sports programming costs and retransmission consent fees.
- Non-programming expenses decreased 0.5%, reflecting decreases in other operating costs, customer service expenses, franchise and regulatory fees and advertising, marketing and promotion costs, partially offset by an increase in technical and product support expenses.
