AT&T activated a record number of iPhones and other integrated 3G devices in its fiscal third quarter, with iPhone activations hitting 3.2 million and integrated-device activations hitting 4.3 million.
Integrated devices feature hard or virtual QWERTY keyboards.
iPhone activations have surged following the late-second-quarter launch of the 16GB and 32GB iPhone 3G S at $199 and $299, respectively, and a reduction in the price of the 8GB iPhone 3G to $99 from $199. The 3G S models launched June 19 double cellular-download speeds and double memory capacity over their predecessors.
Almost 40 percent of iPhones activated in the quarter were sold to consumers new to the AT&T wireless network, the company said.
Also in the third quarter, integrated-device activations of 4.3 million exceeded the second quarter’s 3.5 million integrated-device activations, bringing the percentage of AT&T’s 43.4 million postpaid subscribers using integrated devices to 41.7 percent. Average revenues per integrated-device subscriber was 1.8 times that of the company’s other subscribers.
Overall revenues from selling wireless devices fell slightly in the third quarter by 6.7 percent to $1.26 billion but was up for the first three quarters by 2.8 percent to $3.71 billion. Nonetheless, rising service revenues pushed up total wireless operating revenues by 10 percent in the third quarter to $12.4 billion and 9 percent during the first three quarters to $39.8 billion.