Sprint Nextel Reports First Quarter 2011 Results

Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) today reported that during the first quarter of 2011, the company achieved its best total company wireless net subscriber additions in five years. The company added more than 1.1 million total wireless net subscribers driven by best ever prepaid net subscriber additions of 846,000 and net postpaid subscriber additions of 310,000 for the Sprint brand. Sprint achieved best ever postpaid churn of 1.81 percent and the lowest prepaid churn of 4.36 percent in over five years.

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Sprint reported first quarter consolidated net operating revenues of approximately $8.3 billion, which is a 3 percent increase from the same quarter a year ago, and posted operating income of $259 million. The company also reported Adjusted OIBDA* of $1.5 billion, a net loss of $439 million and a diluted loss per share of 15 cents for the quarter. Sprint generated $178 million of Free Cash Flow* in the quarter. As of March 31, 2011, the company had approximately $4.0 billion in cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments after repayment of $1.65 billion of debt in the quarter. The company does not have any other debt maturities until March 2012.

“With net subscriber additions of 1.1 million, best ever postpaid churn and growing net operating revenues, Sprint maintained the momentum we had exiting 2010,” said Dan Hesse, Sprint CEO. “We’ve added two million wireless subscribers over the past two quarters. In spite of Verizon’s iPhone launch and aggressive competitive responses to it, our simple and unlimited plans, 4G leadership, strong customer service, and successful multi-brand strategy drove solid Sprint performance for the quarter.”

Third parties continue to praise Sprint’s achievements in customer service, wholesale and environmental sustainability. Sprint was named as a J.D. Power 2011 Customer Service Champion. Sprint was one of only 40 companies to earn this distinction as a company that delivers service excellence to U.S. customers – both within their respective industries and across all industries measured. Additionally, in April, Boost Mobile, one of Sprint’s prepaid brands, received the highest rating in the J.D. Power and Associates 2011 Wireless Non-Contract Customer Satisfaction Index (CSI) StudySM. Also this month, industry-leading research firm ATLANTIC-ACM awarded Sprint Global Wholesale Excellence awards for No. 1 in Brand and Voice Value, and U.S. Wholesale Excellence Awards for No. 1 in Brand, Provisioning, Network and Customer Service. Finally, Sprint was again the only U.S. wireless carrier to be named among the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) national top 50 Green Power Partners list. Sprint’s wind-power purchase helped the company secure its No. 19 ranking on the EPA’s Fortune 500® green power partner list.

Sprint has launched or announced 22 4G devices – the largest 4G portfolio of any wireless carrier in the United States. During the first quarter of 2011, Sprint launched its third 4G phone, the HTC EVO™ Shift 4G, and the Overdrive™ Pro 3G/4G Mobile Hotspot by Sierra Wireless. In addition, Sprint announced the upcoming availability of two 4G tablets, the BlackBerry 4G PlayBook™ and HTC EVO View 4G™, as well as two more handsets – the HTC EVO™ 3D and the Nexus S™ 4G from Google™. Sprint currently offers 4G service in 71 markets in 28 states and customers have benefited from expansion of the 4G network footprint and capacity upgrades in many markets.

Sprint has also announced or launched several other additions to its innovative device line up. The award-winning Kyocera Echo™, the nation’s first dual-touchscreen Android™ smartphone was announced in February and launched earlier this month. The first Sprint device with Windows Phone 7, the HTC Arrive™, launched during the first quarter as did the LG Optimus V™, the latest Android phone carried by Virgin Mobile.

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