Earlier today, we reported on AT&T’s better-than-expected earnings, which were once again boosted by its wireless division, and in particular, strong iPhone activations. During the earnings call, the company’s chief financial officer Rick Lindner spoke about the iPhone, improving wireless margins and how the economy was impacting data ARPU. The transcript for the call is at SeekingAlpha. Outtakes from the call below:

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—iPhone sales: Since launching the iPhone 3G in July last year, AT&T (NYSE: T) has nearly six million iPhone 3G activations. In the first quarter, 40 percent of iPhone activations in were for new customers. Lindner also added that their investment into the iPhone was paying off: “We said that our up front investment in iPhone customers would depress margins in the short-term but given the attractive customer profile would support margins in the quarters and years ahead and that is what you see in our first quarter results,” he said.

Wireless Margins: Lindner said the company’s wireless margins were a “pleasant surprise” in the first quarter. Lindner said their expectation and goal had been to get margins back up over 40 percent during this year, and that they were able to do that in the first quarter. Going forward in the year, Lindner said he expected AT&T to maintain margins in that range in the low 40’s. Aside from seasonal factors and some improvement in iPhone dilution, Lindner said one other factor helped in Q1 with margins. Sais Lindner, “After a couple of quarters, primarily driven by the iPhone and some of the integrated devices where we had higher than normal upgrade activity, a higher percentage of our base upgrading during the last couple of quarters, that has started to fall back a little bit and has come back in what I think I would consider to be more of a normal range.”