The following table provides a quick roundup of how the top 11 largest U.S. ILECs (incumbent local exchange carriers) performed in the third quarter 2011 according to access line loss, broadband and video growth. It also lists ongoing activity such as mergers and acquisitions that can affect quarterly performance.
While all of the incumbent wireline operators continued to see erosion of their traditional wireline voice base, they also saw gains in broadband, business and video services.
AT&T (NYSE: T) and Verizon (NYSE: VZ) both saw strong uptick in consumer broadband and video, with AT&T adding 504,000 U-verse broadband and 176,000 U-verse TV customers, and Verizon adding 138,000 FiOS broadband and 131,000 FiOS TV customers. Likewise, CenturyLink (NYSE: CTL), which became the third largest ILEC when it completed its purchase of Qwest, added 57,000 new broadband subscribers in the quarter.
Smaller telcos such as Hawaiian Telcom (Nasdaq: HCOM), which emerged out of bankruptcy last year, saw another quarter of growth in broadband and business services with an ongoing IPTV trial in its Oahu region.
Be sure to take a look at our Q3 2011 earnings summary, which includes more details on each provider's performance in the second quarter of 2011. Or, click on a company's linked title to go to its earnings report for the quarter.
Don't forget to see how these figures stack up against the performance of the Q2 2011, Q1 2011, and Q4 2010 results.
| Top 10 Wireline Service Providers, Q3 2011 | |||||||
| Tier 1-2 ILECs | Revenues | Total Access Lines Q3 | Total Access Lines Q2 | Broad- band Adds |
Total Wireline Broad- band |
Video Additions | M&A |
| AT&T | $31.5 billion | 41.9 million | 42.5 million | 504,000 U-verse HSI | 16.5 million | 176,000 U-verse TV | n/a |
| Verizon | $27.9 billion | 24.5 million | 24.9 million | 20,000 (including 138,000 FiOS Internet) | 8.6 million | 131,000 FiOS TV | completed Cloud Switch acquisition |
| CenturyLink | $10.7 billion | 14.8 million | 15.1 million (due to Qwest acquisition) | 57,000 | 5.85 million | Does not break out video | completed Qwest, Savvis acquisitions |
| Frontier | $1.29 billion | 5.3 million | 5.4 million | 16,200 million | 1.7 million | (lost 3,100 FiOS video customers) | continuing with Verizon line integration |
| Windstream | $1.02 billion | 3.22 million | 3.26 million | 9,300 | 1.35 million | 1,600 | proposed deal for PAETEC |
| FairPoint | $257.9 million | 1.05 million | 1.08 million | 7,320 | 312,475 | n/a | n/a |
| TDS Telecom | $210.8 million | 490,200 | 500,500 | 3,400 | 239,000 | does not break out numbers | integrating IT service company OneNeck |
| Cincinnati Bell | $86 million | 635,300 | 650,600 | 4,000 Fioptics customers | 259,000 | 4,000 Fioptics entertainment customers | n/a |
| Lumos Networks | $51 million | 159,340 | 162,050 | 27 | 34,747 | 3,439 | Completed spinoff from NTELOS as separate company |
| SureWest | $63 million | 100,300 | 105,600 | 2,100 | 101,300 | 800 | n/a |
| Hawaiian Telcom | $97 million | 227,064 | 232,344 | 394 | 83,636 | Conducting IPTV trial in Oahu | n/a |