German telecoms giant Deutsche Telekom (NYSE: DT) reported stable first-quarter results with adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization of 4.7 billion euros ($7.28 billion), virtually unchanged from the same period a year ago. Net revenue was down slightly by 3.1 percent to 15 billion euros, hit by the customers leaving their broadband and fixed line businesses, and the appreciation of the euro against the US dollar and pound sterling. Still, the results were in line with analyst expectations, and the company said it expects to hit its forecast for 2008 of an adjusted EBITDA of approximately EUR 19.3 billion and free cash flow of some EUR 6.6 billion.

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Highlights From the Earnings:

— DT’s mobile unit, T-Mobile scooped up 13.9 million customers in the quarter, with 3.4 million of them coming from its acquisition of Orange Nederland and the US network SunCom. Its total worldwide subscriber base stands at 123 million.

— In Germany, T-Mobile Deutschland reported a 3.4 percent decline in revenue to 1.9 billion euros, and adjusted EBITDA fell 1.1 percent to 692 million euros. DT, which reported its subscriber base in Germany was up 12.3 percent to 37.1 million blamed the falling revenue on “fierce price wars.” But new calling plans—including MyFaves and Max have begun generating “strong demand,” while DT said new flat rate data plans for both cell phones and mobile broadband and its cooperation with Yahoo! (NSDQ: YHOO), which powers the search on its wen’n’walk portal has improved its “competitiveness” in the mobile web.

— T-Mobile USA saw revenues hurt by the declining dollar. Revenue dipped slightly year-on-year by 0.2 percent to 3.5 billion euros, while adjusted EBITDA rose 3.3 percent to EUR 966 million. When measured in US dollars, however, revenue increased by 14.1 percent, and adjusted EBITDA was up 18 percent. DT attributed the growth to stable ARPU rates and “strong” customer growth.

— T-Mobile USA amassed 981,000 net additions in the first three months, three quarters of which were post-pay customers. Another 1.1 million subscribers were added when its purchase of SunCom was consolidated on February 22. T-Mobile USA currently has a total of 30.8 million subscribers. The calling plan MyFaves was doing especially well in the US, with 5.5 million customers at the end of the quarter. SMS and MMS usage was also up from the same quarter last year, with 33 billion messages sent in Q1 2008

— In the UK, T-Mobile revenues were similarly affected by the falling pound. EBITDA for the first quarter of 2008 increased year-on-year by 2.7 percent to EUR 230 million; the gain was 16.0 percent when measured in sterling.

Release | Earnings Report in PDF| DT CEO Rene Obermann Speech