O2 and T Mobile post good first quarter results

Results from the first 3 months of 2006 show both O2 and T Mobile have increased market share and have vastly improved on last years results despite intense competition in the crowded UK market.

O2 have increased customer numbers to 16.3 million, a rise of 359,000 in the first quarter. This rise is 13.6% up on the same period of last year and is being attributed to successful promotions.

Speculation about O2 joining BT in the fixed line market appears to have some foundation as O2’s parent company Telefonica runs similar operations in Europe.

The news comes after O2 scrapped charges for subscribers receiving calls in Europe following pressure from the European Commission. Vodafone and T Mobile were the first to slash roaming costs but Orange quickly followed.

T Mobile has also seen success in their first quarter results. Thanks to the new Flext tariff T Mobile added more contact customers in the first 3 months of 2006 than they did for the whole of 2005.

Most of the 266,000 new customers are tied in to 18 month contracts and the figures have increased the total subscriber base in the UK to 1.6 million users.

T Mobile has taken significant market share from all its rivals in the first quarter and although the profits are actually slightly down they expect increased earnings later this year. Three-quarters of the users signing up to Flext were customers new to T-Mobile.

The company is luring customers away from all its rivals with particular effect on Orange and Vodafone. Orange recently admitted it added only 100,000 customers over the first quarter. Orange appears to have lost its way somewhat in the market as it concentrates on the launch of its combined broadband service over the next few weeks.