News 2002
Virgin Mobile surges ahead with rapid customer growth
24/04/2002
Britain’s newest operator continues to buck market trends with strong sales in Q1
- 164,223 net connections in first three months of 2002
- Total customer numbers climb to 1,609,700 (as of 31st March 2002)
- Customer base increases by 11.3% during Q1
- Best quarter ever for SMS activity
- Average user SMS activity increases by 29% from 2001
Virgin Mobile, the UK’s fifth network, today reported a strong sales performance for the first three months of 2002, continuing its trend-bucking growth in an otherwise declining market. The 164,223 people that joined Virgin Mobile in Q1 means Britain’s biggest consumer mobile brand now has a total of 1,609,700 customers.
Against a backdrop of industry uncertainty, highlighted by recent share price falls at Vodafone and mmO2, Virgin Mobile expects to grow faster than all its UK rivals through 2002. In the Christmas quarter of 2001, the operator was number two, beating T-Mobile, Orange and O2 in terms of net growth. Virgin Mobile, with its continued focus on mainstream consumers and the pre-pay market - a sector being shunned by rivals - expects to attract the most new customers during 2002 and predicts a market-leading performance in Q1, which saw its it total customer base climb by 11.3%.
Virgin Mobile credits its strong sales performance to its ‘no line-rental and cheap calls’ proposition and its on-going retail expansion. Virgin Mobile is now available in over 6,000 outlets - 2000% up on its launch two and a half years ago - with more High Street distribution planned throughout the summer.
And the company’s focus on offering consumers value-for-money and exciting mobile services has helped boost the company’s revenues. Virgin Mobile expects to declare profits for 2002. With its youthful appeal, Virgin Mobile has a growing number of text users: SMS usage achieved record heights in Q1, with an increase of 13% on the previous quarter and a 29% rise on the average number of messages sent per customer during 2001 to an average of 24 messages a month per customer. With the advent of new services, the company expects growth in text messaging and other non-voice services to continue.
Virgin Mobile’s Sir Richard Branson said: “Some our rivals have shifted their focus to locking-in customers with contracts in their hunt for ‘value’, but to such an extent that their growth has virtually stopped. Creating value is more than just raising revenue. It’s about achieving a blend of things: low customer acquisition costs; customer loyalty and tenure through great, yet efficient, service; and, yes, it’s about raising revenues, and that too comes through offering great service and services. Virgin Mobile achieves all these things, as its growing popularity proves. This performance is a great start to the year for us and we’re confident we can continue to grow our business rapidly and profitably through the rest of 2002.”
To plan for increased growth, Virgin Mobile recently announced it was creating 200 new jobs at its Wiltshire headquarters, taking staff numbers to 1,500.
