SBC Communications is making progress over its U.S. peers in broadband, said Randall Stephenson, SBC’s Senior Executive Vice President & CFO, speaking at the Merrill Lynch Global Communications Investor Conference.
At the end of 2003, SBC had 3.5 million DSL customers, compared to 2.5 million for Verizon. Comcast had 5.3 million cable modem customers at the end of 2003, but its net adds dropped off significantly in Q4. Meanwhile, SBC has completed 8 consecutive quarters of growing DSL net additions. DSL coverage is now about 80% of its national footprint.
Thanks to consumer service bundles, local access line losses have slowed significantly.
SBC added 2.9 million long distance customers in Q4 and 8.3 million LD lines for all of 2003.
Stephenson also reviewed the reasoning for the Cingular bid for AT&T Wireless: greater scale, compatible GSM/GPRS networks, additional spectrum for emerging services, and access to AT&T Wireless’ corporate customers. http://www.sbc.com
