T-Mobile added more than twice as many phone subscribers as Verizon in the second quarter of 2015, marking at least five consecutive quarters where the self-proclaimed underdog from Bellevue bested the industry leader in the most coveted customer category.
That’s what we know after Verizon — the undisputed largest carrier — reported its earnings today.
We won’t know how T-Mobile stacks up against other giants until AT&T reports its numbers later this week and Sprint takes its turn next month. But it’s already the newest stat the company is pointing to as it calls itself the “fastest growing wireless company in America.”
T-Mobile CEO John Legere took to Twitter to gloat on Tuesday, posting a link to an article about Verizon’s slowing subscriber growth.
“Verizon Subscriber Growth Cools as Rivals Turn Up The Heat.” But which rival do they mean?! ;) #uncarrier http://t.co/rpXPpq9vTl
— John Legere (@JohnLegere) July 21, 2015
And T-Mobile has good reason to brag.
The company was a distant fourth in the wireless industry just three years ago, as it came off a failed merger attempt with AT&T and was steadily losing customers. It launched the so-called “un-carrier” campaign to stop the bleeding in 2012, and has since rallied back.
T-Mobile has painted itself as the rebellious comeback-kid, shaking up the industry with first-of-their kind promotions and closing the gap between itself and Sprint. The two companies are now neck-and-neck, though T-Mobile has promised to claim the title of No. 3 wireless carrier soon enough. Verizon and AT&T are still distant No. 1 and 2’s, respectively.
T-Mobile is also reportedly up for sale again, with potential suitors including Dish Network.
T-Mobile won’t unveil all its numbers until it releases the official earnings report on July 30, but the company said it added 760,000 postpaid phone customers in a preview earlier this month. That’s up 31 percent from the same time period last year, and compares to 321,000 customer additions Verizon reported today.
Verizon did fare better than T-Mobile in the tablet category, so the two companies came out about even with a total of a little more than 1 million new postpaid customers each.
