EE's chief executive Olaf Swantee
Just five months after launching its first 4G services, Everything Everywhere (EE) this morning reported it has now reached 320,000 4G subscribers in the UK and is on target to achieve 1m subscribers by the end of the year.
The company this morning reported in its Q1 2013 results that it now has 166,000 postpaid customers – more than 53pc of its base, with underlying ARPU (average revenue per user) increasing by 2.2pc compared with the last quarter of 2012.
Postpaid smartphone penetration has grown 11pc to 82pc of EE’s total customer base, with non-voice revenue accounting for 51pc of total revenue.
EE’s plan to double 4G speeds
EE – an amalgamation of Orange and T-Mobile’s mobile networks in the UK – was the first mobile operator in the UK to go live with 4G services after having been awarded 36pc of the UK mobile spectrum market, including spectrum in the 800MHz range and the 2.6GHz range. It paid Ofcom stg£589m for its licences.
EE said 93pc of new and upgrading postpaid handset connections are smartphones of which 42pc are 4G or 4G-ready.
The company in recent weeks announced plans to double current average speeds to 20Mbps for new and existing subscribers and said lab test speeds are now reaching 130Mbps top speeds. The double 4G speeds will be introduced in the 10 cities where EE is operational by the summer, including Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester and Sheffield.
EE said this morning it is on track to deliver 4G to 55pc of the UK’s population by June.
It said its network optimisation programme is continuing apace, with 548 sites decommissioned in the first quarter.
