Turnaround: Vodafone NZ adds 21,000 customers

Vodafone NZ has registered a comeback result for its quarter ending December 31.

The carrier added 21,000 mobile customers, reversing the loss of 35,000 customers in its September quarter.

Vodafone NZ does not release customer numbers, but the figures were revealed today in its UK parent's accounts.

The result shows that Vodafone NZ now has slightly more connections on its books than when it was first threat by the double whammy of Telecom's XT launch, and 2degrees' entry into the market.

The total gain is partly the result of hard-fought marketing, and partly a reflection of the number of total mobile connections growing to exceed New Zealand's total population of humans, thanks to second phones, data sticks and other 3G-capable widgets.

And although market share stats are hard to gauge given 2degrees' failure to front up with customer numbers for more than 11 months, assuming it has around 400,000 connections (which could be extrapolated from the number of people who have taken a Telecom or Vodafone number to the new carrier), then Vodafone NZ's share would sit at 49.07%.

Before the XT and 2degrees launches, it was a shade above 50%.

Although profit has dropped as competition has intensified, in terms of total connection share, Vodafone NZ seems to have done a pretty good job holding the line.

The lastest mobile customer totals:
Vodafone NZ: 2,465,000 (Source: December 2010 quarter financial accounts)
Telecom: 2,152,000 (source: September 2010 quarter financial report)
2degrees: 206,000 (source: 2degrees announcement, February, 2010)

Telecom is due to announce its next half year result (having switched from quarterly results under its new CFO) on February 11. During its September quarter, Telecom lost 19,000 mobile customers as more left its old CDMA network than joined XT.

Privately-held 2degrees has promised a customer number update this month. Its last update was nearly a year ago.

Bigger percentage on contract
Vodafone's percentage of customers on pre-pay (72% at the end of 2009) continued to slowly but surely edge down, falling 0.3% to 68.4%.

The received wisdom is that pre-pay customers are more likely to head for 2degrees, which until recently did not offer any fixed-term plan.

A greater percentage on contract is seen as a good thing, given that such "post-paid" customers tend to spend at least twice as much.

Up and down
Vodafone's recent customer history:

Q4, 2010: 2,511,000
Q3, 2010: 2,484,000
Q2, 2010: 2,493,000
Q1: 2010: 2,504,000
Q4, 2009: 2,479,000
Q3: 2009: 2,444,000 (2degrees launches)
Q2: 2009: 2,465,000 (Telecom XT launches)