T-Mobile US CEO Michael Sievert Talks Subscriber Gains

Published Jul 31, 2024, 6:12 PM

T-Mobile US CEO Michael Sievert discusses subscriber gains. He speaks with Ed Ludlow on Bloomberg Television.

Delighted to bring in the president and CEO of T Mobile, Mike Seever, who joins me on set in New York City.

Good morning, it's great to be here. Thanks for having me.

Really interesting that number to subscribe a number because I look at your peers and competition who also seem to be doing well. So it raises the question, where are your gains coming from from them or is there just like this new generation of customer that's appeared.

Well, we're seeing nice organic growth in the industry. So everybody did pretty well. Both my principal competitors I think had net gains that were a little better than expected.

But T Mobile took the prize.

I mean, this was the biggest Q two for post paid net phone editions ever in our history, and we.

Took took the price from who is what I'm trying to Well, we.

Took more than AT and T and Verizon combined. So this is still a share taking story for us. And you know, of course the industry is growing, that's healthy, that's positive. But T Mobiles the disproportionate winner in the growth game. Our post paid service revenues up seven percent year over year, more than twice the pace of the principal competitors.

Mike back in California. We're a T Mobile householder and I use Verizon for my kind of work business line. But it's the technology story that I'm most interested in. You know, I think back to when the I fifteen Pro generation came out. I went there because of incentive, a credit back on a new handset, the incentive of having multiple lines on one account.

And I always want.

To know how much of a factor that' still is for you guys to kind of think, well, what can we do on the incentive side to either renew existing customers or bringing new ones.

Well, customers have always trusted T Mobile to be the best value in the industry. That's our legacy, that's our heritage. And what's interesting is now that we're the best network in the industry. Also, some would expect us to give up that value position, but we're not gonna. You know, we have the best promotions, we have the best overall value.

We give you more, we ask less of you, and we have the balance sheet and the cost.

Structure to defend that value position for the long haul.

It's great to have you on Bloomberg Technology here in New York. And one of the technology stories with t Mobiles fiber KKR Loomos, I think you've talked about the importance of that in the ramp, but I wondered if you just give me some specifics why and also how you grow your investment and why you did it.

Last week we announced our second transaction in the space. The first one was Loumos a couple months ago. Last week we announced that we are combining collaborating with KKR.

To purchase metro Net.

And metro Net is the fastest growing pure play fiber company in America and arguably the most important, and so it's really terrific to be collaborating with KKR. Our joint business plan for this asset and this team is to grow at past six and a half million homes passed within the planning period now to twenty thirty and to do so without further capital calls.

Is the long time opportunity for you. Bundling. So you look at your subscriber customers, you look at what the household does with you. You want them to do more. Is that the idea? Well, it's the current opportunity.

Remember Tea Mobile's a major broadband provider today in fact, we have five point six million broadband customers through our fixed wireless product. This quarter Q two, T Mobile took our highest percentage share of broadband net ads ever in our history, seventy five percent. When you add up all fiber, all cable, and all fixed wireless one brand, T Mobile took seventy five percent with over four hundred thousand net editions. And so our value proposition is resonating with people, and part of it is sure they trust our brand and they want to buy wireless from US and broadband from US.

Stock's now up four percent and in the session up about fourteenth eight year today. This is Bloomberg Technology. One of the companies that I cover is SpaceX. I'm really interested in the Starling relationship. But when I flew here on a United Airlines flight, I was able to access Wi Fi and flight because I'm a T Mobile customer. You've got different options there. What's the big picture strategy?

Well, first of all, I'm glad you acknowledged that benefit. This is so exciting.

We have partnerships with because United doesn't have Starling is my point advact, and we have.

Partnerships with most of the major US airlines, such that T Mobile customers get free WiFi on flights and it's so great, and we're doing that through satellite connectivity with a number of partners. But what you're asking about is our exclusive arrangement with SpaceX. We have a technology alliance and we intend to be the first ones to bring satellite connectivity to your day to day usage of your mobile phone. And the vision here that's joined between us is to eliminate dead zones. The idea that if you can see the sky, you're connected and you can message, text and eventually make phone calls and have some data to be connected to the people and the issues that you care about.

An interesting technology conversation and you acknowledge the competition and growth across your industry as well. Might see that T Mobile CEO and of course President of T Mobile