T-Mobile US raised its guidance for the back half of 2020 after posting strong results in Q3, with executives highlighting faster than expected progress reaping the benefits of its merger with Sprint following the deal’s close in April.

On an earnings call, CEO Mike Sievert said the operator expects to reap $1.2 billion in synergies from the transaction this year, a figure he said was “way ahead of plan” and included $600 million in network benefits from avoided site builds and early decommissioning of some Sprint infrastructure. Such savings are expected to more than double in 2021, he added.

CTO Neville Ray noted approximately 15 per cent of post-paid Sprint traffic was carried on T-Mobile’s network, up from approximately 10 per cent at the end of Q2. The operator expects decommissioning of Sprint sites to ramp in 2021 rather than in the 2023 or 2024 timeframe originally forecast, he added, with approximately 35,000 sites set to be retired.

Metrics
T-Mobile crossed the 100 million subscriber milestone in the quarter, as post-paid net additions rose year-on-year from 1 million to 1.9 million. The figure included 689,000 phone subscribers, down from 754,000 in the year-ago period.

Profit of $1.3 billion increased 44 per cent from Q3 2019, with revenue up 74 per cent to $19.3 billion.

The operator boosted its outlook for H2 2020, forecasting adjusted EBITDA of between $13.6 billion and $13.7 billion, up from $12.4 billion to $12.7 billion previously. It added a metric for post-paid phone net customer additions, targeting between 1.3 million and 1.4 million.