The prelude to 2013's 4G battle has intensified as mobile operator Three UK has announced that it has gained almost a million customers in the past year.
In its annual financial report, Three said that it had added 900,000 new customers in 2012, an increase of 11 per cent year on year to 9.1 million. In comparison, the UK's biggest network, EE, has about 28 million customers.
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Three UK, which is owned by Hutchison Whampoa, increased revenues by nine per cent from 2011 to £1.9bn, with a profit of £101m, only the second time the firm has posted a profit since its inception, the first being in 2011.
The firm said it had an 18 per cent increase in contract customers, with its prepaid user base also growing, against the industry trend.
The firm has now made a profit in the last two years, as it readies itself for a 4G battle in the coming months. EE has had a head start in the area, but its financial report of 2012 showed that it made a loss of £249m while it did not disclose how many of its net additions in the fourth quarter of 2012 had signed up specifically for 4G, suggesting that the firm's 4G launch had not yet proved overly successful.
EE has also been criticised for its pricing structures, as customers were asked to pay an additional £5 for access to the same amount of data they were entitled to on their 3G contracts. Three UK has said it will not charge customers extra to upgrade to the 4G services.
But Ovum analyst Matthew Howett believes that the "all you can eat data" approach to counter EE's proposition is not the right move.
"All you can eat data with 4G would be an alarming move and would put at risk the later ability to monetise 4G services, so I'm hopeful that operators will put a cap on data like EE has but perhaps add something extra to entice away people who are not happy with EE's tariff," he said.
Three, Vodafone and O2 are expected to launch their 4G services in the second quarter of 2013, and the services are expected to go live in May or June, an Ofcom spokesperson told Computing.
