Vendor Highlights

• In terms of retail postpaid net additions, Verizon Wireless closed the quarter at 1 million net additions, while AT&T finished with 875,000.

• On the prepaid side, MetroPCS finished with 687,000 net additions and TracFone ended the quarter with 567,000 net additions. Leap Wireless also finished with strong net adds for the quarter, totaling 492,000.

Market Outlook

• Prepaid subscribers make up 19.2% of the subscribers for the top 10 carriers. By the end of 1Q10, IDC expects the total wireless retail carriers to have reached almost 286 million retail subscribers. IDC projects gross numbers to continue to remain close to 20 million users during 2Q09. Prepaid carriers should continue to show strong results in the second quarter of 2009.

• Currently, there are 274 million total wireless subscribers in the United States.

"With the wireless subscriber market reaching a point of saturation in the United States, carriers are becoming more aware of movement among customers," Murphy added. "Wireless carriers must not just focus on bringing new customers in the door; they must also pay attention to current customers. Those carriers that are able to avoid customer churn will stay competitive."

The IDC report, 1Q Wireless Gross Subscriber Additions: Prepaid Carriers Continue to Grow (Doc #218581), tracks gross wireless subscribers on a quarterly cycle with a breakdown by percentage of the prepaid/postpaid markets. In addition, the IDC report, U.S. Mobile Data Services Qview, 1Q09 (forthcoming ), provides the U.S. market and vendor share results for the top 10 wireless carriers in the United States in over 20 top-line categories. including a Rest of Market category. This report also drills down into the data services that are used by consumers.