AT&T Inc (T) 2022 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Thank you for standing by. Welcome to AT&T's Third Quarter 2022 Earnings Call. (Operator Instructions) Following the presentation, the call will be open for questions. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

謝謝你的支持。歡迎參加 AT&T 的 2022 年第三季度財報電話會議。 （操作員說明）演示結束後，電話將開放提問。 （操作員說明）作為提醒，本次會議正在錄製中。

I would like to turn the conference call over to our host, Amir Rozwadowski, Senior Vice President, Finance and Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

我想將電話會議轉交給我們的主持人，財務和投資者關係高級副總裁 Amir Rozwadowski。請繼續。

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to our third quarter call. I'm Amir Rozwadowski, Head of Investor Relations for AT&T. Joining me on the call today are John Stankey, our CEO; and Pascal Desroches, our CFO.

謝謝大家，大家早上好。歡迎來到我們的第三季度電話會議。我是 AT&T 投資者關係主管 Amir Rozwadowski。今天和我一起參加電話會議的是我們的首席執行官 John Stankey；和我們的首席財務官 Pascal Desroches。

Before we begin, I need to call your attention to our safe harbor statement. It says that some of our comments today may be forward-looking. As such, they're subject to risks and uncertainties described in AT&T's SEC filings. Results may differ materially. And as always, additional information and earnings materials are available on the Investor Relations website.

在我們開始之前，我需要提醒您注意我們的安全港聲明。它說我們今天的一些評論可能是前瞻性的。因此，它們受到 AT&T 提交給美國證券交易委員會的文件中描述的風險和不確定性的影響。結果可能大不相同。與往常一樣，投資者關係網站上提供了更多信息和收益材料。

With that, I'll turn the call over to John Stankey. John?

有了這個，我會把電話轉給 John Stankey。約翰？

Thanks, Amir. Good morning, everyone. This morning, we shared our third quarter results, which, yet again, demonstrate our strong execution in delivering critical connectivity services to our customers.

謝謝，阿米爾。大家，早安。今天早上，我們分享了第三季度的業績，這再次證明了我們在為客戶提供關鍵連接服務方面的強大執行力。

Earlier this month, we saw just how vital these services truly are. In the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Ian, the ability to connect with others proved to be invaluable to so many people. And our teams were, yet again, some of the very first to arrive on the scene, working tirelessly for our customers. The effort they made, along with first responders, supported by FirstNet, to keep our network running in some of the hardest hit areas was nothing short of heroic. I'm really grateful for their sacrifices, and all of AT&T is proud of their efforts.

本月早些時候，我們看到了這些服務的真正重要性。在伊恩颶風的毀滅性後果中，與他人聯繫的能力被證明對很多人來說是無價的。我們的團隊再次成為第一批到達現場的人，為我們的客戶不知疲倦地工作。在 FirstNet 的支持下，他們與急救人員一起為保持我們的網絡在一些受災最嚴重的地區運行而做出的努力簡直是英勇的。我真的很感謝他們的犧牲，AT&T 的所有人都為他們的努力感到自豪。

I'd also like to say thank you to our teams for their solid execution in deploying our mid-band 5G spectrum and building out best-in-class fiber-based access solutions. As you can see from our results, we continue to deliver strong customer growth on the back of our focused 5G and fiber strategy.

我還要感謝我們的團隊在部署我們的中頻 5G 頻譜和構建一流的基於光纖的接入解決方案方面的出色執行。正如您從我們的結果中看到的那樣，在我們專注的 5G 和光纖戰略的支持下，我們繼續實現強勁的客戶增長。

The demand for fast and reliable 5G and fiber is at an all-time high, and our disciplined and consistent go-to-market strategy continues to resonate. In addition, as we begin to lap investments we need to optimize our networks, improve our distribution and transform our business, we're now seeing the benefits of our growth fall to the bottom line, as we suggested they would and as evidenced by accelerating adjusted EBITDA growth.

對快速可靠的 5G 和光纖的需求空前高漲，而我們紀律嚴明、始終如一的上市戰略繼續引起共鳴。此外，當我們開始進行投資時，我們需要優化我們的網絡、改善我們的分銷並轉變我們的業務，我們現在看到我們的增長收益下降到了底線，正如我們所建議的那樣，並且加速證明了這一點調整後的 EBITDA 增長。

Let me dive in a bit. In Mobility, we posted another strong quarter of growth by adding 708,000 postpaid phone net adds. As I stated in prior quarters, our consistent results are being driven by an improved value proposition, better network experience and our ability to meet our customers where their needs are. We're creating efficiencies through our distribution, and acquisition costs are improving. This is helping us drive further gains in operating leverage.

讓我潛入一點。在移動方面，我們通過增加 708,000 個後付費電話淨增加，實現了又一個強勁的季度增長。正如我在前幾個季度所述，我們始終如一的業績是由改進的價值主張、更好的網絡體驗以及我們滿足客戶需求的能力推動的。我們正在通過我們的分銷提高效率，並且採購成本正在提高。這有助於我們進一步提高經營槓桿率。

This past quarter, our teams delivered across 3 key performance measurements: strong postpaid phone net adds, accelerating ARPU growth and higher Mobility EBITDA. In fact, the third quarter marked our highest wireless service revenue growth year-over-year in more than a decade, and we now expect to achieve wireless service revenue growth at the upper end of the 4.5% to 5% range. This is about 200 basis points higher than where we expected to land at the start of the year, thanks to continued net add strength and ARPU growth.

在上個季度，我們的團隊交付了 3 個關鍵績效指標：強勁的後付費電話淨增長、加速 ARPU 增長和更高的移動性 EBITDA。事實上，第三季度是我們十多年來無線服務收入同比增幅最高的一年，我們現在預計無線服務收入增長將達到 4.5% 至 5% 範圍的上限。由於持續的淨增加強度和 ARPU 增長，這比我們在年初預期的水平高出約 200 個基點。

Now let's jump to fiber, where we continue to invest in building out a premium network and deliver on our stated expectations for steady customer growth. The success of our strategy is evidenced by the fact that we just posted our 11th straight quarter with more than 200,000 fiber net adds, with 338,000 net adds this past quarter.

現在讓我們跳到光纖，我們將繼續投資建設優質網絡，並實現我們對穩定客戶增長的預期。我們剛剛連續第 11 個季度發布了超過 200,000 根光纖淨增加量，上個季度淨增加了 338,000 根光纖，這一事實證明了我們戰略的成功。

We're finding success in serving more customers in new and existing markets with what is the best wired Internet offering available. We're increasing share in our fiber footprint and converting more IP broadband Internet subscribers to fiber subscribers. This is driving favorable ARPU trends and profitable growth within our overall Consumer Wireline business.

我們正在成功地為新市場和現有市場的更多客戶提供可用的最佳有線互聯網產品。我們正在增加我們在光纖足跡中的份額，並將更多的 IP 寬帶互聯網用戶轉變為光纖用戶。這推動了我們整體消費者有線業務的有利 ARPU 趨勢和盈利增長。

Ultimately, our fiber strategy is a long-term play, centered around a best-in-class network technology with a multi-decade lifespan. When others finally decide they need to upgrade their infrastructure, we will already be providing our customers with great service and sustainable technology. Simply put, where we have fiber, we win. And the numbers show we expect to keep winning.

歸根結底，我們的光纖戰略是一項長期戰略，以具有數十年生命週期的一流網絡技術為中心。當其他人最終決定他們需要升級他們的基礎設施時，我們已經為我們的客戶提供了優質的服務和可持續的技術。簡而言之，我們有纖維，我們就贏了。數字顯示我們希望繼續獲勝。

So let's step back for a minute and take a look at what we've done so far this year across 3 quarters. We've achieved what we expect will be an industry best with more than 2.2 million postpaid phone net adds. Additionally, our teams are deploying our mid-band 5G spectrum quickly and efficiently, and the spectrum assets we're rolling out are performing even better than our high expectations.

因此，讓我們退後一步，看看我們今年迄今為止在三個季度中所做的工作。我們已經實現了我們預期的行業最佳，擁有超過 220 萬個後付費電話網絡。此外，我們的團隊正在快速高效地部署我們的中頻 5G 頻譜，我們正在推出的頻譜資產的表現甚至超出了我們的高預期。

As a result, we've achieved our already increased year-end target of 100 million mid-band 5G POPs and now expect to reach more than 130 million people by the end of the year, nearly double our expectations when we entered the year. This progress is benefiting our customers as well. In fact, since the start of the year, our already consistent download speeds have increased materially as a result of our mid-band deployment.

因此，我們已經實現了已經增加的 1 億個中頻 5G POP 的年終目標，現在預計到今年年底將覆蓋超過 1.3 億人，幾乎是我們進入今年時預期的兩倍。這一進展也使我們的客戶受益。事實上，自今年年初以來，由於我們的中頻部署，我們本已穩定的下載速度已大幅提高。

We're also approaching 1 million AT&T Fiber net adds for the year, and we've added nearly 2.3 million fiber locations through 3 quarters to bring our total customer locations to 18.5 million. This keeps us on track to achieve our target of 30 million-plus locations by the end of 2025. In summary, I'm very happy with the strong, high-quality and durable customer adds, network enhancements and improving financial returns we're seeing across our twin growth engines of 5G and fiber.

今年我們的 AT&T 光纖淨增加量也接近 100 萬，我們在 3 個季度內增加了近 230 萬個光纖站點，使我們的客戶站點總數達到 1850 萬個。這使我們有望在 2025 年底之前實現超過 3000 萬個地點的目標。總之，我對強大、高質量和持久的客戶增加、網絡增強和財務回報的提高感到非常滿意看到我們的 5G 和光纖雙增長引擎。

Moving to our next priority. It's more important than ever that we be effective and efficient across our operations. We continue to have strong visibility on achieving more than $4 billion of our $6 billion transformation cost savings run rate target by the end of this year.

轉到我們的下一個優先事項。比以往任何時候都更重要的是，我們在整個運營過程中保持高效和高效。我們繼續對在今年年底前實現 60 億美元的轉型成本節約運行率目標中的 40 億美元有強烈的認識。

As I said earlier, we're beginning to see savings start to contribute to the bottom line. We're transforming our business as the world continues to face what feels like a period of uncertainty. Many of the economic trends that we spoke about at the start of the year and the assumptions that we've been operating under are now coming to fruition.

正如我之前所說，我們開始看到儲蓄開始有助於盈利。隨著世界繼續面臨一段充滿不確定性的時期，我們正在改變我們的業務。我們在年初談到的許多經濟趨勢以及我們一直在運作的假設現在正在實現。

This is one reason why we focus so intently on reorienting our business, whether it was asset dispositions, investing in cost transformation or our proactive decision to address rising inflation through a measured pricing strategy. As a result, our balance sheet has improved, our network performance continues to get better, and we're now seeing some benefits to our profit trends. This is a direct result of acting when we did and how we did it.

這就是為什麼我們如此專注於重新定位我們的業務的原因之一，無論是資產處置、成本轉型投資，還是我們通過衡量定價策略應對不斷上升的通貨膨脹的積極決定。結果，我們的資產負債表得到了改善，我們的網絡性能繼續變得更好，我們現在看到了我們的利潤趨勢的一些好處。這是我們何時採取行動以及如何採取行動的直接結果。

Our third quarter results demonstrate that our business can deliver even against the challenging backdrop. The current environment is not easy to predict, but our flexibility affords us the ability to meet or surpass all of our financial commitments while investing in the best technology available.

我們第三季度的業績表明，即使在充滿挑戰的背景下，我們的業務也可以交付。當前環境不容易預測，但我們的靈活性使我們能夠在投資可用的最佳技術的同時滿足或超越所有財務承諾。

Now turning to our capital allocation strategy. The long-term economic justification for our investments in 5G and fiber remains fundamentally sound, and we're continuing to invest through this cycle to support future growth. These investments will prove to be the foundation of AT&T over the next few decades.

現在轉向我們的資本配置策略。我們投資 5G 和光纖的長期經濟理由從根本上說是合理的，我們將繼續在這個週期中進行投資以支持未來的增長。這些投資將被證明是未來幾十年 AT&T 的基礎。

We feel confident our approach will prove to be increasingly beneficial with each passing year as data demand and traffic continues to grow dramatically. Our strength and focus on core connectivity is helping us meet customers' needs, and we're growing mobility and fiber subscribers in a disciplined and profitable manner quarter after quarter after quarter.

我們相信，隨著數據需求和流量的持續急劇增長，我們的方法將證明每年都越來越有益。我們的實力和對核心連接的關注正在幫助我們滿足客戶的需求，我們正在以一種有紀律和盈利的方式一個又一個季度地增加移動性和光纖用戶。

This makes me very comfortable with our ability to continue improving the cash yields of our business going forward. Our free cash flow for the quarter was in line with our expectations despite higher third quarter capital investment spend, and we're on track to deliver on our previously stated $24 billion capital investment plan for the year.

這讓我對我們未來繼續提高業務現金收益率的能力感到非常滿意。儘管第三季度資本投資支出增加，但我們本季度的自由現金流符合我們的預期，並且我們有望實現我們之前宣布的今年 240 億美元的資本投資計劃。

At the same time, we hope this healthy free cash flow for the quarter gives you confidence in our ability to achieve our target for free cash flow in the $14 billion range for the year, a level that is more than ample to support our $8 billion dividend commitment. Before I turn this over to Pascal, allow me to finish with this.

同時，我們希望本季度健康的自由現金流能讓您對我們實現全年 140 億美元自由現金流目標的能力充滿信心，這一水平足以支持我們的 80 億美元股息承諾。在我把它交給帕斯卡之前，請允許我完成這個。

Our results demonstrate that the strategy we put forward more than 2 years ago is the right strategy for not only the future of our business, but for the future of the communications industry. We're focused on creating sustainable and scalable businesses that drive a free cash flow flywheel for many years.

我們的結果表明，我們在兩年多前提出的戰略不僅對我們業務的未來，而且對通信行業的未來都是正確的。我們專注於創建可持續和可擴展的業務，多年來推動自由現金流飛輪。

We continue to hold ourselves accountable for earnings growth against our historic levels of investment, which you'll see through improved cash conversion moving forward. We're confident that the investments and choices we're making will benefit our customers and shareholders now and in the future, while also setting the stage for our next act as America's best broadband provider.

我們繼續根據我們的歷史投資水平對盈利增長負責，您將通過改進現金轉換來看到這一點。我們相信，我們所做的投資和選擇將使我們現在和未來的客戶和股東受益，同時也為我們作為美國最佳寬帶提供商的下一步行動奠定基礎。

Let me now turn it over to Pascal to discuss the details of the quarter. Pascal?

現在讓我把它交給帕斯卡來討論本季度的細節。帕斯卡？

Thank you, John, and good morning, everyone. Let's start by taking a look at our subscriber results for our market focus areas on Slide 5. Our consistent Mobility strategy remains successful as we delivered 708,000 postpaid phone net adds in the quarter. Since we began our transformation 9 quarters ago, we've delivered nearly 7 million postpaid phone net adds, along with improved ARPU.

謝謝你，約翰，大家早上好。讓我們首先在幻燈片 5 上查看我們的市場重點領域的訂戶結果。我們一貫的移動戰略仍然成功，因為我們在本季度交付了 708,000 部後付費電話網絡。自從我們在 9 個季度前開始轉型以來，我們已經交付了近 700 萬次後付費電話網絡，同時 ARPU 也有所提高。

Looking at AT&T Fiber. We totaled 338,000 net adds in the quarter. This marks our second best quarter ever. Our plan in Consumer Wireline remains centered on pivoting from a copper-based product to fiber, and we're doing just that. Over the past 9 quarters, we've gone from 4.3 million AT&T Fiber subscribers to now approaching a subscriber base of 7 million. So we're really pleased with the momentum we have with customers in the marketplace across mobility and fiber.

看看 AT&T 光纖。本季度我們總共淨增加了 338,000 人。這標誌著我們有史以來第二好的季度。我們在消費者有線方面的計劃仍然集中在從基於銅的產品轉向光纖，我們正在這樣做。在過去的 9 個季度中，我們的 AT&T Fiber 用戶從 430 萬增加到現在接近 700 萬的用戶群。因此，我們對移動和光纖市場客戶的發展勢頭感到非常滿意。

Now let's move to our third quarter consolidated financial summary on Slide 6. First, as a reminder, with the closing of the Warner Media transaction in April, historical financial results have been recast to present Warner Media and certain other divested businesses, including Vrio, Xandr and Playdemic as discontinued operations.

現在讓我們轉到幻燈片 6 上的第三季度合併財務摘要。首先，提醒一下，隨著 4 月華納媒體交易的結束，歷史財務業績已經重新反映華納媒體和某些其他被剝離的業務，包括 Vrio， Xandr 和 Playdemic 已終止運營。

Additionally, there continues to be some year-over-year comparative challenges as the prior year results also included DIRECTV for 1 month and other 2021 dispositions for a partial quarter. Therefore, where applicable, I will highlight our financial results on a comparative like-for-like basis.

此外，由於上一年的結果還包括 1 個月的 DIRECTV 和部分季度的其他 2021 年處置，因此仍然存在一些與去年同期相比的挑戰。因此，在適用的情況下，我將在比較類似的基礎上強調我們的財務業績。

Comparative revenues for the quarter were $30 billion, up 3.1% or more than $900 million versus a year ago. This is largely driven by wireless revenue growth and, to a lesser extent, higher Mexico and Consumer Wireline revenues. This was partly offset by a decline in Business Wireline.

本季度的比較收入為 300 億美元，比去年同期增長 3.1% 或超過 9 億美元。這主要是由無線收入增長推動的，在較小程度上是由墨西哥和消費者有線收入增加推動的。這在一定程度上被 Business Wireline 的下降所抵消。

Comparative adjusted EBITDA was up nearly 5% year-over-year as growth in Mobility, Consumer Wireline in Mexico were partly offset by a decline in Business Wireline. We expect the year-over-year EBITDA trend lines to improve for the balance of the year as we continue to grow our wireless and fiber customer bases and lap 3G network shutdown costs and stepped-up investments in technology that began in the second half of 2021.

比較調整後 EBITDA 同比增長近 5%，原因是墨西哥移動、消費者有線業務的增長部分被商業有線業務的下降所抵消。我們預計，隨著我們繼續擴大無線和光纖客戶群、降低 3G 網絡關閉成本以及從 2018 年下半年開始加大對技術的投資，今年剩餘時間的 EBITDA 同比趨勢線將有所改善2021 年。

Adjusted EPS from continuing operations for the quarter was $0.68. On a comparative stand-alone AT&T basis, adjusted EPS was $0.62 in the year ago quarter. The quarter also includes a recurring favorable impact of about $140 million to adjusted EPS from retirement/medical benefit plan change. For the full year, we now expect adjusted EPS from continuing operations to be $2.50 or higher.

本季度持續經營業務的調整後每股收益為 0.68 美元。在比較獨立的 AT&T 基礎上，去年同期調整後的每股收益為 0.62 美元。本季度還包括因退休/醫療福利計劃變更而對調整後的每股收益產生約 1.4 億美元的經常性有利影響。對於全年，我們現在預計持續經營業務的調整後每股收益為 2.50 美元或更高。

Cash from operating activities for our continuing operations came in at $10.1 billion for the quarter, up 9% year-over-year. Capital investments of $6.8 billion was up $1.3 billion year-over-year, and we continue to expect capital investments in the $24 billion range for the year. Free cash flow was $3.8 billion. DIRECTV cash distributions were about $1 billion in the quarter. Overall, we remain on track to achieve or surpass all of our previously shared financial targets for the year.

本季度，我們持續運營的經營活動產生的現金為 101 億美元，同比增長 9%。 68 億美元的資本投資同比增長 13 億美元，我們繼續預計今年的資本投資在 240 億美元範圍內。自由現金流為 38 億美元。本季度 DIRECTV 的現金分配約為 10 億美元。總體而言，我們仍有望實現或超過我們之前共享的本年度財務目標。

Now let's take a deeper look at our Communications segment operating results, starting with Mobility on Slide 7. Our Mobility business continues its strong subscriber momentum and positive profitability trends. Revenues were up 6%, with service revenues growing 5.6%, driven by subscriber growth.

現在讓我們從幻燈片 7 中的移動性開始更深入地了解我們的通信部門的經營業績。我們的移動性業務繼續保持其強勁的用戶勢頭和積極的盈利趨勢。在用戶增長的推動下，收入增長了 6%，服務收入增長了 5.6%。

Mobility postpaid phone ARPU was $55.67, up $0.86 sequentially and 2.4% year-over-year. This continues to come in ahead of our expectations. This is largely a result of benefits from our targeted pricing actions, improved roaming trends and more customers trading up to higher-priced unlimited plans.

移動後付費電話 ARPU 為 55.67 美元，環比增長 0.86 美元，同比增長 2.4%。這繼續超出我們的預期。這主要得益於我們有針對性的定價行動、改進的漫遊趨勢以及更多客戶購買更高價格的無限計劃。

With regard to EBITDA, we delivered our highest Mobility EBITDA ever. Year-over-year, Mobility EBITDA increased 5.5%, driven by wireless revenue growth. We remain confident that Mobility EBITDA growth will continue to accelerate through the balance of the year due to revenue growth and the lapping of 3G network shutdown investments that began in the second half of 2021. So we're really happy with our Mobility performance, and our consistent strategy is yielding great results.

關於 EBITDA，我們提供了有史以來最高的流動性 EBITDA。在無線收入增長的推動下，移動性 EBITDA 同比增長 5.5%。我們仍然相信，由於收入增長和 2021 年下半年開始的 3G 網絡關閉投資的結束，移動 EBITDA 增長將在今年餘下時間繼續加速。因此，我們對移動性能感到非常滿意，並且我們一貫的戰略正在取得豐碩的成果。

Now let's turn to our operating results for Consumer and Business Wireline on Slide 8. Our fiber growth remains strong, and we continue to win share where we have fiber. Our total Consumer Wireline revenues are up again this quarter even with continued declines from nonfiber broadband services.

現在讓我們來看一下幻燈片 8 上消費者和商業有線的經營業績。我們的光纖增長依然強勁，並且我們繼續在擁有光纖的地方贏得份額。即使非光纖寬帶服務持續下降，本季度我們的消費者有線總收入再次上升。

Broadband revenues grew 6.1% due to fiber revenue growth and higher broadband ARPU, driven by customer mix shift to fiber. Our fiber ARPU was $62.62, and we expect that to continue to improve as more customers roll off legacy promotional pricing and on to simplified pricing constructs.

由於客戶組合轉向光纖，光纖收入增長和寬帶 ARPU 提高，寬帶收入增長了 6.1%。我們的光纖 ARPU 為 62.62 美元，我們預計隨著越來越多的客戶放棄傳統的促銷定價並轉向簡化的定價結構，這一點將繼續改善。

Looking forward, remember that seasonality in the fourth quarter typically results in lower industry net adds. We expect EBITDA growth to remain strong on a year-over-year basis for the balance of 2022. This will be driven by growth in broadband revenues and the lapping of technology investments that began in the second half of 2021.

展望未來，請記住，第四季度的季節性通常會導致行業淨增加值下降。我們預計 2022 年剩餘時間 EBITDA 同比增長將保持強勁。這將受到寬帶收入增長和從 2021 年下半年開始的技術投資的推動。

Looking at Business Wireline. We continue to restructure and rationalize our portfolio with a focus on core connectivity where we have owners' economics. In this regard, we continue to grow our connectivity services revenue as both 5G and fiber offerings continue to perform well.

看著商業有線。我們繼續重組和合理化我們的投資組合，重點關注我們擁有所有者經濟的核心連通性。在這方面，隨著 5G 和光纖產品繼續表現良好，我們的連接服務收入將繼續增長。

Our enterprise mobility momentum remains strong, with Business Wireless service revenue growth of 7.9% and a sequential increase in our FirstNet wireless base of 334,000. Additionally, we had about $100 million in revenue from intellectual property transaction in the quarter. This is about $80 million more than the prior year. For context, this is an action we've taken in the past when favorable opportunities arise.

我們的企業移動勢頭依然強勁，Business Wireless 服務收入增長 7.9%，FirstNet 無線用戶數連續增加 334,000 個。此外，本季度我們從知識產權交易中獲得了約 1 億美元的收入。這比上一年增加了大約 8000 萬美元。就上下文而言，這是我們過去在有利機會出現時採取的行動。

Now I'd like to quickly touch on our capital allocation strategy. Overall, our priorities remain unchanged, and we're largely past the heavy lift of reorienting our company's focus on our core connectivity strengths. As a result, we've established a more sustainable financial structure that better positions us for the current environment. We also have enough flexibility to invest in our business while meeting our financial obligations.

現在我想快速談談我們的資本配置策略。總體而言，我們的優先事項保持不變，並且我們基本上已經完成了將公司的重點重新定位在我們的核心連接優勢上的繁重工作。因此，我們建立了一個更可持續的財務結構，使我們更好地適應當前環境。我們也有足夠的靈活性來投資我們的業務，同時履行我們的財務義務。

In the third quarter, the $3.8 billion in free cash flow we delivered was largely in line with our expectations. And given the expected timing of our capital investments, we feel good about our line of sight to achieving our free cash flow target in the $14 billion range for the year. We are very comfortable with our cash levels after paying our dividend commitment, and this should only increase in the future years as we expect cash conversion to improve from here.

第三季度，我們交付的 38 億美元自由現金流基本符合我們的預期。鑑於我們資本投資的預期時機，我們對實現今年 140 億美元範圍內的自由現金流目標的前景感到滿意。在支付股息承諾後，我們對我們的現金水平感到非常滿意，而且這只會在未來幾年增加，因為我們預計現金轉換將從這裡改善。

Our results today have only further solidified our confidence that we will exit 2022 stronger than we entered the year. In fact, we continue to expect EBITDA growth and higher free cash flows in 2023. We also plan to continue to use excess cash after dividends to reduce debt with a goal of reaching a net debt to adjusted EBITDA range of 2.5x. And as we typically do, we'll provide 2023 guidance when we share our fourth quarter results.

我們今天的結果進一步鞏固了我們的信心，即我們將比進入今年更強大地退出 2022 年。事實上，我們繼續預計 2023 年 EBITDA 增長和更高的自由現金流。我們還計劃繼續使用股息後的多餘現金來減少債務，目標是使淨債務達到 2.5 倍調整後的 EBITDA 範圍。正如我們通常所做的那樣，我們將在分享第四季度業績時提供 2023 年的指導。

Amir, that's our presentation. We're now ready for Q&A.

阿米爾，那是我們的介紹。我們現在準備好進行問答了。

Thank you, Pascal. Operator, we're ready to take the first question.

謝謝你，帕斯卡。接線員，我們準備回答第一個問題。

(Operator Instructions) And our first question today comes from the line of Phil Cusick with JPMorgan.

（操作員說明）我們今天的第一個問題來自摩根大通的 Phil Cusick。

I guess, first, Pascal, the free cash flow bridge to $14 billion, just to reiterate, help us think about that as we go into the fourth quarter. You need at least $6 billion, and you said CapEx, it sounds like it's coming down. That's a good part of it. And then as we think about next year, for what you can give us, how should we think about things like taxes, pension as well as the industry overall? And I know you don't want to update it, but given how much the world has changed, is that $20 billion free cash flow guide even relevant anymore?

我想，首先，帕斯卡是通往 140 億美元的自由現金流的橋樑，重申一下，幫助我們在進入第四季度時考慮這一點。你至少需要 60 億美元，而且你說資本支出，聽起來它正在下降。這是其中一個很好的部分。然後當我們考慮明年時，對於你能給我們的東西，我們應該如何考慮稅收、養老金以及整個行業的問題？我知道你不想更新它，但考慮到世界已經發生了多大的變化，那 200 億美元的自由現金流指南是否還有意義？

Phil, I appreciate the question. Maybe let's start. With regard to the $14 billion for this year, the simple way to think about it, we delivered $3.8 billion this quarter. And that is when we spent $6.8 billion in capital. Next quarter, we reiterated our guide for the full year of $24 billion. So next quarter, that would suggest around $4.5 billion.

菲爾，我很欣賞這個問題。也許讓我們開始吧。關於今年的 140 億美元，簡單地考慮一下，我們本季度交付了 38 億美元。那時我們花費了 68 億美元的資本。下個季度，我們重申了全年 240 億美元的指導方針。所以下個季度，這將意味著大約 45 億美元。

And so you do the simple math, that gets you exactly where you need to get to for the full year. And as a general matter as well, the fourth quarter -- the back half of the year, we always convert at a higher rate than the first half of the year. So all in all, great line of sight.

因此，您進行簡單的數學運算，即可準確得出全年所需到達的位置。一般來說，第四季度——今年下半年，我們的轉化率總是高於上半年。所以總而言之，視線很好。

In terms of next year, you mentioned the macros. That is the very reason why we are not providing updated guidance right now, and we're going to stick to our -- what we communicated last quarter in that we'll update you at year-end when we report our fourth quarter results.

就明年而言，您提到了宏。這就是我們現在不提供更新指導的原因，我們將堅持我們上個季度傳達的內容，我們將在年底報告第四季度業績時向您更新。

With that said, as you heard from my prepared remarks, we expect EBITDA and cash to grow next -- free cash flow to grow next year. In fact, if we just look at this past quarter, we grew cash from continuing ops nearly 10%. So it's really strong growth -- organic growth from the business, and this is exactly what we anticipated coming into the year.

話雖如此，正如您從我準備好的講話中聽到的那樣，我們預計 EBITDA 和現金接下來會增長——自由現金流明年會增長。事實上，如果我們只看上個季度，我們從持續運營中獲得的現金增長了近 10%。所以這是非常強勁的增長——業務的有機增長，這正是我們對今年的預期。

What are the factors that are going to drive improved earnings and cash next year? Mobility. Our mobility business is performing much better than we expected coming into the year. Subscriber base is bigger than we anticipated, and ARPU trends are better.

哪些因素將推動明年收益和現金的改善？流動性。我們的移動業務在今年的表現比我們預期的要好得多。用戶群比我們預期的要大，ARPU 趨勢更好。

Two, fiber. Again, fiber is performing really well. and the mix shift that we're seeing to fiber comes with higher profit margins, higher ARPU. So that's also expected -- Consumer Wireline is expected to grow next year. We should see some moderation in the overall Business Wireline trends because of the cost efforts that we are undertaking. And then you layer on top of that things like transformation savings, more broadly, starting to fall to the bottom line as our investments begin to have a peak and begin to dissipate over time.

二、纖維。同樣，光纖的表現非常好。我們看到光纖的混合轉變帶來了更高的利潤率和更高的 ARPU。所以這也是預期的——消費者有線預計明年將增長。由於我們正在進行成本努力，我們應該看到整體商業有線趨勢有所緩和。然後，您在諸如轉型儲蓄之類的事情之上，更廣泛地說，隨著我們的投資開始達到頂峰並隨著時間的推移開始消散，開始下降到底線。

So -- and lower interest is another factor to keep in mind as we delever. And then all that is going to be partially offset by higher cash taxes. Magnitude, I'd say, is consistent with what we've previously guided, and then slightly less DTV distributions.

所以——降低利息是我們去槓桿時要記住的另一個因素。然後所有這些都將被更高的現金稅部分抵消。我想說的是，幅度與我們之前的指導一致，然後 DTV 分佈略少。

All in all, we feel really good about the trajectory of the business. And when you look at an annual dividend commitment of $8 billion and a growing free cash flow, the model is working exactly as we anticipated.

總而言之，我們對業務的發展軌跡感到非常滿意。當您查看 80 億美元的年度股息承諾和不斷增長的自由現金流時，該模型的工作方式與我們預期的完全一樣。

Our next question comes from the line of Brett Feldman with Goldman Sachs.

我們的下一個問題來自高盛的 Brett Feldman。

Really, just sort of 2 here on fiber. The first is, it's great to see that the fiber net adds continue to gain momentum. You now have a larger fiber broadband subscriber base than nonfiber, but you haven't quite turned the corner sustainably yet on net positive broadband growth. And so I was hoping you can comment on how you see the path unfolding there. And do you just need a bigger fiber footprint to get there?

真的，在光纖上只有 2 種。首先是，很高興看到光纖網的增加繼續獲得動力。您現在擁有比非光纖更大的光纖寬帶用戶群，但您還沒有完全轉向可持續的淨正寬帶增長。所以我希望你能評論你如何看待那裡的道路。您是否只需要更大的光纖足跡才能到達那裡？

And then the follow-up on that question is, there was a report yesterday you're considering a potential fiber JV. I'm sure you're somewhat limited on what you can say. So the higher level question would be, your existing fiber build is being completely funded out of your cash flow from operations. So if you were looking to do something incremental, including with a partner, what kind of boxes would you have to check? Is this about speed or breadth or potentially something else?

然後對這個問題的跟進是，昨天有一份報告說你正在考慮建立一家潛在的光纖合資企業。我敢肯定，你能說的有些有限。因此，更高層次的問題是，您現有的光纖構建完全由您的運營現金流提供資金。因此，如果您希望做一些漸進的事情，包括與合作夥伴一起做，您需要檢查什麼樣的框？這是關於速度或廣度還是其他潛在問題？

Brett, I appreciate the question. Certainly, a bigger fiber footprint allows us to improve our relative net add performance in broadband. I think the short answer to your question is, for the next several quarters, we'll be in this dance around, what I would call, at least on the subscriber counts, something close to near 0.

布雷特，我很欣賞這個問題。當然，更大的光纖足跡使我們能夠提高我們在寬帶中的相對淨添加性能。我認為對您的問題的簡短回答是，在接下來的幾個季度中，我們將在這場舞蹈中徘徊，我會稱之為，至少在訂閱者數量上，接近於 0。

But you ought to understand, as Pascal just indicated to you, our yields on fiber customers are, of course, much better than our copper customers. Combination of ARPU, churn characteristics and, frankly, the operating performance profile, which, I know you've observed that there's still room for our margin expansion in the Consumer Wireline business and that we should be looking at that relative to others in the industry.

但是您應該明白，正如 Pascal 剛剛向您指出的那樣，我們的光纖客戶產量當然比我們的銅客戶好得多。結合 ARPU、客戶流失特徵以及坦率地說，經營業績概況，我知道您已經觀察到，我們在消費者有線業務中仍有擴大利潤率的空間，相對於業內其他公司，我們應該考慮這一點.

And I think that's an accurate observation over time as we continue to scale the business, that we'll continue to improve profitability in it. But we still have several quarters of working through the dynamic of getting the legacy dynamics out of the business and focusing on the new infrastructure and the growth, and that's a journey we're committed to. And I think you're seeing that it's got strong economic promise as we move through that and continue to increase the size of the fiber base.

我認為隨著時間的推移，隨著我們繼續擴大業務規模，這是一個準確的觀察，我們將繼續提高其盈利能力。但我們仍有幾個季度的工作要做，以擺脫傳統動力並專注於新的基礎設施和增長，這是我們致力於的旅程。而且我認為您會看到，隨著我們不斷前進並繼續增加纖維基地的規模，它具有強大的經濟前景。

I don't know that I could add a whole lot to you on your question about what we might think about in terms of doing other fiber builds that are out of our operating territory. First of all, I'm not going to acknowledge your comment specifically on some of the speculation that's shown up in the media. But I think I have shared most recently when I was in Arizona, and we were doing the work in Mesa, that we're evaluating it under many of the same sort of criteria and circumstances that we look at within our existing operating footprint.

我不知道我可以為您補充很多關於我們可能會考慮在我們的運營領域之外進行其他光纖構建的問題。首先，我不會特別承認您對媒體上出現的一些猜測的評論。但我想我最近在亞利桑那州時分享過，我們正在梅薩做這項工作，我們正在根據我們在現有運營範圍內看到的許多相同類型的標準和情況對其進行評估。

Number one, can we go in and be the first fiber provider in that area? Two, do we believe it's a market where the brand is going to perform, and we'll get the rate and pace of penetration that we need to make an economic return on it? Three, can we build because of the dynamics around a particular municipality or area cost effectively and quickly with a relatively low overhead around that and get, what I would call, an operating scale in that geography that warrants the fixed cost infrastructure start-up? And then finally, do we think that there's some interplay in terms of having the asset and improving value in our wireless business as we operate in the area as well, and it marries into our distribution?

第一，我們可以進入並成為該地區的第一家光纖供應商嗎？第二，我們是否相信這是一個品牌將要發揮作用的市場，並且我們會獲得我們需要的滲透率和速度來獲得經濟回報？第三，我們能否根據特定城市或地區的動態，以相對較低的開銷有效且快速地進行建設，並在該地區獲得（我所說的）保證固定成本基礎設施啟動的運營規模？最後，我們是否認為在我們在該地區開展業務時，在擁有資產和提高無線業務價值方面存在一些相互作用，並且與我們的分銷相結合？

So to the extent that we found opportunities like that, that had as competitive returns is building in our region, I think the management team would have to evaluate those types of things and think about how it moves forward on them. And I would tell you, as I've indicated as well, that there will be some federal subsidy monies coming in, in places, and we should use that same set of criteria in that same model as we think about are there opportunities for us to pair our capital with possibly a public capital to open up opportunities that we might not have pursued otherwise.

因此，就我們發現這樣的機會而言，隨著我們地區的競爭回報正在建立，我認為管理團隊將不得不評估這些類型的事情並考慮如何在這些事情上取得進展。而且我會告訴你，正如我已經指出的那樣，在某些地方會有一些聯邦補貼資金進來，我們應該在我們認為的相同模型中使用相同的標準集 我們是否有機會將我們的資本與可能的公共資本配對，以開闢我們可能不會追求的機會。

Our next to the line of Simon Flannery with Morgan Stanley.

我們旁邊是摩根士丹利的西蒙弗蘭納里。

John, you opened your comments mentioning the world faced a period of uncertainty. You've been looking at that for a little while. It would be great if you could, and Pascal, update us on what you're seeing real time, both on the business side in terms of cutting back IT budgets, et cetera, and how that may evolve over the next few quarters as they deal with some of the stresses from inflation demand?

約翰，你打開你的評論提到世界面臨著一段不確定的時期。你已經看了一段時間了。如果您可以和 Pascal 向我們實時更新您所看到的內容，那就太好了，無論是在業務方面，還是在削減 IT 預算等方面，以及在接下來的幾個季度中這可能會如何演變應對通脹需求帶來的一些壓力？

And then on the consumer side, obviously, you've called out the [DSO] issue last quarter. Good to hear the free cash flow reiterated this quarter. So perhaps you could update us on payment trends on bad debts and how we should think about churn here as your sort of pricing increases sort of mature going forward?

然後在消費者方面，很明顯，你在上個季度提到了 [DSO] 問題。很高興聽到本季度重申了自由現金流。因此，也許您可以向我們提供有關壞賬支付趨勢的最新信息，以及隨著您的定價方式逐漸成熟，我們應該如何考慮這裡的客戶流失？

Sure. Simon, why don't I start, and then Pascal is welcome to add any color on things I don't treat appropriately here. Look, on the business side, one is, I would tell you, I think the overriding dynamic in business is actually somewhat disconnected from the economy. And that is where we're in a secular change to cloud, and we're in a secular change to SDN.

當然。西蒙，我為什麼不開始，然後歡迎帕斯卡為我在這裡不恰當對待的東西添加任何顏色。看，在商業方面，我會告訴你，我認為商業中最重要的動力實際上與經濟有些脫節。這就是我們對雲的長期變化，我們對 SDN 的長期變化。

And we've talked about that, and I've talked about it, and it's one of the reasons we're repositioning the business segment. And I think it's one of the reasons why us making sure that we are very careful in how we deploy owned and operated infrastructure that we can handle business workloads on is so important to us.

我們已經討論過，我也討論過，這是我們重新定位業務部門的原因之一。我認為這就是為什麼我們要確保非常謹慎地部署可以處理業務工作負載的自有和運營基礎設施對我們來說如此重要的原因之一。

When we think about that dynamic, we actually play very well into an efficiency story for most -- established in large businesses. And it's a little bit of a painful transition. But over time, we'll get through it, and there'll be upside back in the core connectivity business on owned and operated infrastructure.

當我們考慮這種動態時，我們實際上很好地融入了大多數人的效率故事 - 在大型企業中建立。這是一個痛苦的過渡。但隨著時間的推移，我們會度過難關，自有和運營的基礎設施的核心連接業務將會有上行空間。

And that's simply the private networks that we had previously put out that were highly managed and highly architected are now moving to SDN-based technologies that are less managed but more bandwidth intensive. And we want to play into the uplift on putting more bandwidth-intensive infrastructure out there and selling those connections on owned and operated infrastructure. But the enterprise gets an efficiency benefit out of SDN because those less managed networks are not as costly to them on an aggregate basis.

這就是我們之前推出的高度管理和高度架構的專用網絡現在正在轉向基於 SDN 的技術，這些技術管理較少但帶寬密集度更高。我們希望推動更多帶寬密集型基礎設施的推出，並在自有和運營的基礎設施上出售這些連接。但是企業從 SDN 中獲得了效率優勢，因為這些管理較少的網絡在總體上對他們來說成本並不高。

And so I don't think the move from an economic perspective, if there are budgets that are strapped, is necessarily going to impact that transition. If it did anything, it might slow it down a bit. If it slowed it down, it would probably, frankly, be somewhat beneficial to us because margin structures on existing architectures are a little bit more attractive than on new infrastructure.

因此，如果預算緊張，我認為從經濟角度來看，這一舉措不一定會影響這一轉變。如果它做了什麼，它可能會減慢一點。如果它放慢速度，坦率地說，它可能會對我們有所幫助，因為現有架構的保證金結構比新的基礎設施更具吸引力。

But if ultimately people view it as an efficiency move and they want to run their businesses more efficiently, I think those trends are manifested in what you've seen over the last several years in the business. And I don't know that they will necessarily adjust as a result of that.

但是，如果最終人們將其視為一種提高效率的舉措，並且他們希望更有效地經營他們的業務，我認為這些趨勢體現在您在過去幾年中所看到的業務中。我不知道他們是否會因此而調整。

In the small business side, certainly, small business formation can be a hit during a down economic cycle. And I would expect that, in the business segment, that might be something that we ultimately see occur if there's a more moderate economic growth environment. But once again, unfortunately, for us, we're under-indexed in the small business segment.

在小企業方面，當然，小企業的形成可能會在經濟下行週期中受到打擊。我預計，在業務領域，如果經濟增長環境更加溫和，我們最終可能會看到這種情況。但是，不幸的是，對我們來說，我們在小型企業領域的指數再次不足。

We're working to change that, and we're demonstrating progress in that regard. But my embedded base of subscribers in that area for what we do in advanced networking is not as strong in the fixed market as I might like it to be. So I don't know that we'll be overly impacted by that.

我們正在努力改變這一點，我們正在展示這方面的進展。但是，我在該領域的嵌入式訂戶基礎對於我們在高級網絡中所做的事情在固定市場上並不像我希望的那樣強大。所以我不知道我們是否會受到過度影響。

We could see some softness in the wireless space if, in fact, the economy ultimately did -- had a little bit harder sledding, moving forward that might moderate some wireless growth. But look, we've been getting more than our fair share in that segment. A lot of it's been driven out of FirstNet. I don't expect that trend didn't necessarily abate right now even in a down economic cycle.

如果事實上經濟最終確實如此，我們可能會看到無線領域的一些疲軟——雪橇有點困難，向前發展可能會減緩一些無線增長。但是看，我們在該細分市場中獲得的份額超過了我們應得的份額。其中很多都被趕出了FirstNet。我認為即使在經濟下行週期中，這種趨勢現在也不一定會減弱。

Relative to some of your other questions on other economic characteristics and how it impacts the business, we've seen no change in DSO relative to last quarter. We are back to pre-pandemic levels. We characterized that for you last quarter. There hasn't been any additional slip. We, I think, accurately reflected to you in our guidance what the impact was going to be for the year.

相對於您對其他經濟特徵及其對業務的影響的其他一些問題，我們發現 DSO 與上一季度相比沒有變化。我們回到了大流行前的水平。我們在上個季度為您描述了這一點。沒有任何額外的失誤。我認為，我們在指導中準確地向您反映了這一年的影響。

Last quarter, that's still tracking consistently with what we articulated to you. We're seeing bad debt start to return back to pre-pandemic levels. Certainly, we'll have to watch that if the economy sours further. It tends to correlate to what occurs in the economy, but I see nothing right now that would suggest we're out of pattern on anything.

上個季度，這仍然與我們向您闡明的內容保持一致。我們看到壞賬開始回到大流行前的水平。當然，如果經濟進一步惡化，我們將不得不注意這一點。它往往與經濟中發生的事情相關，但我現在沒有看到任何跡象表明我們在任何事情上都脫離了模式。

We certainly haven't done anything to change credit standards in our approaches and practices to managing credit quality. And I think you've seen how we performed in the past in that regard, where we have a high-quality base that allows us to kind of manage through those dynamics reasonably well if the economy goes one way or the other.

在我們管理信用質量的方法和實踐中，我們當然沒有做任何改變信用標準的事情。而且我認為您已經看到了我們過去在這方面的表現，我們擁有高質量的基礎，如果經濟朝著某種方向發展，我們可以相當好地管理這些動態。

As I characterized earlier today in some of my public comments, churn is up a bit. It's not out of line with what we expected when we did the pricing changes. We were able to execute the pricing change in a way that we feel very comfortable with.

正如我今天早些時候在一些公開評論中所描述的那樣，流失率有所上升。這與我們進行定價更改時的預期不符。我們能夠以一種我們覺得非常舒服的方式執行定價變化。

Most importantly, the vast majority of our customers are talking to us. They're making adjustments to their plans, moving them into higher-value plans while having higher ARPUs on them, return more value to the customer that allows them to be a stickier and longer-lived customer. We think that over the long haul is great.

最重要的是，我們的絕大多數客戶都在與我們交談。他們正在調整他們的計劃，將其轉移到更高價值的計劃中，同時擁有更高的 ARPU，從而為客戶帶來更多價值，從而使他們成為更具粘性和壽命更長的客戶。我們認為從長遠來看是很棒的。

On the margin, there has been some churn moving out that we expected. It's no greater than what we expected. It still makes the pricing changes accretive overall, and you certainly have seen that manifested in the numbers and the operations that have come forward.

在邊際上，出現了一些我們預期的流失。它並不比我們預期的要大。它仍然使定價變化總體上增加了，你肯定已經看到這體現在數字和已經出現的操作上。

And our next question comes from the line of John Hodulik with UBS.

我們的下一個問題來自瑞銀的 John Hodulik。

Okay. Great. You guys have some real momentum in wireless in terms of subs, ARPU and now even margins. I mean, just give us a sense for the -- what kind of visibility you have that those 3 metrics continue to head in the right direction?

好的。偉大的。就訂閱用戶、ARPU 甚至現在的利潤率而言，你們在無線領域有一些真正的動力。我的意思是，讓我們了解一下——這三個指標繼續朝著正確的方向發展，你有什麼樣的可見性？

And then as a follow-up, with the broadband fiber expansion and potentially the [balance sheet] JV, if there's any change in the view on fixed wireless? Obviously, both Ryzen and T-Mobile are having a lot of success in selling that product. Just your view on that as we head into 2023.

然後作為後續行動，隨著寬帶光纖的擴張和可能的 [資產負債表] 合資企業，如果對固定無線的看法有任何變化？顯然，Ryzen 和 T-Mobile 在銷售該產品方面都取得了很大的成功。在我們進入 2023 年之際，這只是您對此的看法。

So John, I think our visibility is really good. I mean we run a subscription-based business. And as you know, those customer relationships tend to be pretty sticky relationships. And we have every ability to understand how we're bringing the customer in today and at what profitability level they're coming in. We understand the base and how the base is performing.

所以約翰，我認為我們的能見度非常好。我的意思是我們經營基於訂閱的業務。如您所知，這些客戶關係往往是非常粘稠的關係。我們完全有能力了解我們今天如何吸引客戶以及他們的盈利水平如何。我們了解基礎以及基礎的表現。

I think we have reasonable ways to look at some of the dynamics that change around things like roaming and have visibility toward those impacts and how they're going to work through. You just heard my commentary with Simon on some of the bigger drivers of profitability in the subscription business around churn and how we think about the dynamics associated with that.

我認為我們有合理的方法來看待圍繞漫遊等事物發生變化的一些動態，並了解這些影響以及它們將如何發揮作用。您剛剛聽到了我與 Simon 的評論，內容涉及訂閱業務中圍繞客戶流失的一些更大的盈利驅動因素，以及我們如何看待與此相關的動態。

So when I look at our ability to kind of understand why we're getting operating momentum, we communicated to you at the beginning of the year that you should expect the back half story on this, and you're seeing the back half story. And now we're in the middle of the fourth quarter right now, we're obviously aware of what our numbers are right now. And I would say, we have confidence that we're going to be able to deliver those continued leverage dynamics that we talked about.

因此，當我看到我們能夠理解為什麼我們獲得運營動力的能力時，我們在年初與您溝通過，您應該期待後半部分的故事，而您正在看到後半部分的故事。現在我們正處於第四季度中期，我們顯然知道我們現在的數字是多少。我想說，我們有信心能夠提供我們談到的那些持續的槓桿動態。

So I feel pretty good about our visibility on that subscription base. And we've built a quality subscription base and brought in quality customers that are now starting to give us that profitability lift as well as we have visibility into our cost structure and all the work that we've done around that.

因此，我對我們在該訂閱基礎上的知名度感到非常滿意。我們已經建立了一個高質量的訂閱基礎並引入了高質量的客戶，這些客戶現在開始為我們帶來盈利能力提升，並且我們對我們的成本結構以及我們圍繞它所做的所有工作都有了可見性。

And as I've said since the beginning of the year that we would start to see some of that move to the bottom line as we stabilized our promotional position in the market, which, I think, you've seen us do, and we are still maintaining market momentum with that. And so I feel really good about it.

正如我自今年年初以來所說的那樣，隨著我們穩定了我們在市場上的促銷地位，我們將開始看到其中一些轉變為底線，我想，你已經看到我們這樣做了，我們仍然保持市場勢頭。所以我對此感覺非常好。

I don't know that anything has changed in fixed wireless. As I said repetitively that it has a place in our portfolio. That place is not broad-scale deployment in every operating territory and geography that we operate in. We -- the way I would characterize it, I'd rather take 1 million new fiber customers a year than 1 million new fixed wireless customers a quarter. The value equation of those 1 million fiber customers is a far superior value equation for the long haul for our shareholders.

我不知道固定無線有什麼變化。正如我反复說過的那樣，它在我們的投資組合中佔有一席之地。那個地方並不是在我們運營的每個運營區域和地理區域都進行大規模部署。我們——按照我的描述，我寧願每年新增 100 萬光纖客戶，也不願每季度新增 100 萬固定無線客戶.從長遠來看，這 100 萬光纖客戶的價值方程式對我們的股東來說是一個優越得多的價值方程式。

And as a result of that, we're focused on ensuring that we can continue to grow our fiber footprint and bring on those high-value, sustainable durable relationships where we're able to have a network infrastructure that matches consumer consumption dynamics now and into the future. Fixed wireless will be that answer in a small number of geographies and applications and homes. It will not be to our entire nationwide base.

因此，我們專注於確保我們能夠繼續擴大我們的光纖足跡並建立那些高價值、可持續的持久關係，在這些關係中，我們能夠擁有一個與現在消費者消費動態相匹配的網絡基礎設施，並且進入未來。在少數地區、應用程序和家庭中，固定無線將成為答案。它不會影響到我們整個全國的基地。

And so investing shareholder money at the front end right now just to drive top line growth that I don't think is sustainable over a 3-, 4-, 5-year period is not the best use of my management team's time and the best use of our scarce capital. The best use of it is to put it against putting in durable infrastructure, continuing to bring on high-value wireless customers, build our wireless network to be really effective in the next set of applications that are going to be necessary to bring the promise of 5G to life as we start to see the dynamics of autonomy and vehicles emerge, some of the medical monitoring capabilities, private 5G that starts to work into the enterprise space.

因此，現在在前端投資股東資金只是為了推動收入增長，我認為這在 3 年、4 年、5 年期間是不可持續的，這並不是對我的管理團隊時間的最佳利用，也是最好的使用我們稀缺的資本。它的最佳用途是反對建立持久的基礎設施，繼續吸引高價值的無線客戶，建立我們的無線網絡以在下一組應用中真正有效，這些應用將是實現承諾所必需的隨著我們開始看到自主和車輛出現的動態，5G 的生活，一些醫療監控功能，私人 5G 開始進入企業空間。

We want our wireless network to be ready to service those workloads and do it in a pristine fashion because we think those revenues will come back with the kind of margin characteristics that we've typically operated the wireless business at. And so I feel really comfortable with our balance about that, and we'll use fixed wireless as we move into next year, where it's appropriate to use it, but it will not be broad scale.

我們希望我們的無線網絡準備好為這些工作負載提供服務並以原始方式進行，因為我們認為這些收入將會以我們通常運營無線業務的那種利潤率特徵回歸。所以我對我們在這方面的平衡感到非常滿意，我們將在明年使用固定無線網絡，在那裡使用它是合適的，但規模不會很大。

Pascal, did I miss anything from your perspective there?

帕斯卡，從你的角度來看，我錯過了什麼嗎？

No.

不。

And our next question comes from the line of David Barden with Bank of America.

我們的下一個問題來自美國銀行的大衛巴登。

I guess a couple, if I could. I guess the first question, Pascal, could you talk a little bit about how the interest rate environment is affecting the income statement? I guess, specifically, with respect to probably 2 items: one is the fixed versus floating; and the other would be how the net impact on the pensions is being affected in terms of discount rate for the PBO and then, obviously, the impact on returns to the portfolio.

我猜是一對，如果可以的話。我想第一個問題，帕斯卡，你能談談利率環境如何影響損益表嗎？我想，具體來說，可能有兩個項目：一個是固定與浮動；另一個是 PBO 的貼現率如何影響對養老金的淨影響，然後顯然是對投資組合回報的影響。

I guess the second piece I would ask would be on the wireless business. Obviously, the DISH wholesale arrangement was expected to be kind of a big contributor or a tailwind as we go into the year. Could you just talk about how, if at all, that's affected this year's performance to date and how we might expect that to evolve?

我想我要問的第二個問題是關於無線業務。顯然，隨著我們進入這一年，DISH 批發安排有望成為一種重要的貢獻者或順風。你能否談談，如果有的話，這對今年迄今為止的表現有何影響，以及我們預計會如何發展？

Okay. In terms of, first, the interest rate environment. One of the things that we did, Dave, over the last 2, 3 years is to really reconstruct our maturity towers and took advantage of historically low interest rates we were seeing coming out of the pandemic. As a result, right now, we have a debt tower -- a series of debt outstanding that are yielding around 4% on average, and 95% of it is fixed. And if you look at our maturities over the next several years, our free cash flows after dividend could largely handle those.

好的。首先，利率環境。戴夫，在過去 2、3 年裡，我們所做的其中一件事是真正重建我們的成熟度塔，並利用我們從大流行中看到的歷史低利率。結果，現在，我們有一個債務塔——一系列未償債務，平均收益率約為 4%，其中 95% 是固定的。如果你看看我們未來幾年的到期情況，我們在股息後的自由現金流可以在很大程度上處理這些問題。

In the instance that there are slightly higher towers, we can always roll on a short-term basis. But what we've done is we've reconstructed the way we are managing capital such that we can really continue to delever over the next several years without any meaningful need to go out to the market to raise debt. So that interest rate.

在塔稍高的情況下，我們總是可以短期滾動。但我們所做的是我們已經重建了我們管理資本的方式，這樣我們就可以在未來幾年真正繼續去槓桿化，而不需要去市場籌集債務。所以說利率。

In terms of pension mark-to-market, in terms of pension, big picture from a cash standpoint. For the foreseeable future, let's talk the next decade, there's probably no need to fund the pension plan. Now with that said, there is, with the discount rate coming down, we've had some -- going up, we've had some big gains that we normalized out of our reported earnings. On a -- going through next year, I would expect higher pension expense because of the fact that now we have -- we're going to be discounting at higher interest rates.

就養老金按市值計價而言，就養老金而言，從現金的角度來看是大局。在可預見的未來，讓我們談談下一個十年，可能不需要為養老金計劃提供資金。話雖如此，隨著貼現率的下降，我們已經獲得了一些 - 上升，我們已經從報告的收益中正常化了一些巨大的收益。在 - 到明年，我預計養老金費用會更高，因為現在我們有 - 我們將以更高的利率貼現。

But all in all, those are noncash pieces that, when we think about the long-term profile of operating this company, the fact -- what's most important to us is that there is no need to go fund the pension plan for the foreseeable future. And in terms of the DISH MVNO, it's not a meaningful contributor this year. We would anticipate, as we look out the next several years, it should ramp up. And we feel really good about the overall arrangement with this.

但總而言之，這些都是非現金部分，當我們考慮運營這家公司的長期概況時，事實上——對我們來說最重要的是在可預見的未來沒有必要為養老金計劃提供資金.而就 DISH MVNO 而言，今年它並不是一個有意義的貢獻者。我們預計，隨著我們展望未來幾年，它應該會增加。我們對此的整體安排感覺非常好。

And our next question comes from the line of Michael Rollins with Citi.

我們的下一個問題來自花旗銀行的邁克爾·羅林斯。

Just to dig in a little bit more to wireless. In the presentation, it was flagged that the business wireless service revenue grew 8% year-over-year, and I think the total was around 6%. So curious if you can unpack a bit more of the differences in trends that you're seeing between the business side of wireless and the consumer side of wireless?

只是為了更深入地了解無線。在演示文稿中，有人指出商業無線服務收入同比增長 8%，我認為總數約為 6%。很好奇您是否可以解開更多您在無線業務方面和無線消費者方面看到的趨勢差異？

And then as you're talking about the next stages of 5G and the opportunities, I was reading in the press release that you're flagging the success of IoT and connected device volumes. I'm curious if you can unpack that a little bit more in terms of, I think the automotive industry was one place you referenced in the release on success. Where are you seeing success in those verticals? And are you seeing any kind of inflection in the near to medium term where this B2B IoT opportunity could become more [expansive] for AT&T and the industry?

然後當你談論 5G 的下一階段和機遇時，我在新聞稿中讀到你正在標記物聯網和連接設備數量的成功。我很好奇您是否可以從以下方面了解更多信息，我認為汽車行業是您在成功發布中提到的一個地方。您在哪些垂直領域看到了成功？您是否看到在中短期內這種 B2B 物聯網機會可能對 AT&T 和整個行業變得更加 [廣泛] 的任何形式的轉折？

Sure, Mike. Let me see if I can get at your first question. I think I understand what you're looking for. If I don't quite hit this, then feel free to follow up with me. But look, there's no 2 businesses are alike is the first thing I'd tell you. And so as you look at kind of how you would characterize the relative profitability of a business subscriber coming on, a lot depends on which segment you're looking at.

當然，邁克。讓我看看能不能回答你的第一個問題。我想我明白你在找什麼。如果我沒有完全做到這一點，請隨時跟進我。但是看，沒有兩個企業是相似的，這是我要告訴你的第一件事。因此，當您查看如何描述即將到來的商業訂戶的相對盈利能力時，很大程度上取決於您所關注的細分市場。

I would tell you, generally speaking, our highest ARPU dynamics tend to occur in the consumer market when you kind of look at what we're able to do in family plan structures and what occurs there. Our growth in business, still highly profitable growth, but under some constructs like what we are able to do with FirstNet approaches. As you would expect, people who buy at larger volume tend to get better rates.

我會告訴你，一般來說，當你看看我們在家庭計劃結構中能夠做什麼以及在那裡發生的事情時，我們最高的 ARPU 動態往往出現在消費市場。我們的業務增長，仍然是高利潤的增長，但在一些結構下，比如我們能夠用 FirstNet 方法做的事情。正如您所料，購買量大的人往往會獲得更好的價格。

And so you see that ultimately flow through, or maybe your ARPU dynamics around business are going to be a little bit less than what they might be in the consumer segment where people aren't able to buy at that kind of volume. Now having said that, you're looking at our overall ARPU trends, and you're seeing them improve and start to accrete and grow. And that's reflective of the fact that while we're doing very well in the business segment taking share, we're still growing ARPU in aggregate.

因此，您會看到最終流動，或者您圍繞業務的 ARPU 動態可能會比人們無法以這種數量購買的消費者細分市場中的情況要少一些。話雖如此，您正在查看我們的整體 ARPU 趨勢，您會看到它們有所改善並開始增加和增長。這反映了這樣一個事實，雖然我們在業務領域的份額做得很好，但我們的 ARPU 總體仍在增長。

So despite those differences in the average ARPUs and what's occurring, we are still managing to grow that ARPU dynamic overall, and that's a healthy place for us to be right now. And as you've seen, our margin structure, relatively stable as we go through this quarter, and that's what's helping, of course, on some of the cash yields.

因此，儘管平均 ARPU 和正在發生的事情存在這些差異，但我們仍在設法整體提高 ARPU 的動態，這對我們來說是一個健康的地方。正如您所看到的，我們的保證金結構在本季度中相對穩定，這當然有助於一些現金收益率。

On the IoT side, look, our mainstay of profitability in IoT comes in vehicles. That really hasn't changed. I don't expect in the near term, over the course of what I would call the guidance and planning cycle, that that's going to demonstrably change moving forward. I think there's a good opportunity for us to find the next level of growth in automotive.

在物聯網方面，看，我們在物聯網中的主要盈利能力來自車輛。這真的沒有改變。我不期望在短期內，在我稱之為指導和規劃週期的過程中，這將在未來發生明顯的變化。我認為我們有很好的機會找到汽車的下一個增長水平。

And I think we, given our strong position in that market today, are well positioned to continue to work in that regard. And I think, when you think about each vehicle out there and the intensity of communication that's going to occur, there's an opportunity for growth in that space to build on. And that's one of the most attractive areas that we'll continue to push in.

我認為，鑑於我們今天在該市場的強勢地位，我們有能力繼續在這方面工作。而且我認為，當您考慮到那裡的每輛汽車以及將要發生的交流強度時，該空間就有機會在此基礎上發展壯大。這是我們將繼續推進的最具吸引力的領域之一。

Do I think that over time that in the spaces of manufacturing and medical devices that there's also an IoT opportunity to develop that -- as we get beyond what I would call the planning and guidance cycle that we gave you? I do. But I don't think those are going to be the kind of thing that as we characterize an update for you for 2023 that you're going to see those factor in, in any meaningful way in kind of business-to-business revenues that you look at and say that their pattern changes overall. Hopefully, that's responsive to your questions, Mike. If you want to refine the first one, feel free to follow up here.

我是否認為隨著時間的推移，在製造和醫療設備領域也有一個物聯網機會來開發它——因為我們超越了我所說的我們給你的規劃和指導週期？我願意。但我認為，當我們為您描述 2023 年的更新時，您不會以任何有意義的方式在企業對企業的收入中看到這些因素，你看著並說他們的模式總體上發生了變化。希望這能回答你的問題，邁克。如果您想完善第一個，請隨時在此處跟進。

It's very helpful. And I was just thinking, just even on the top line service revenue side, with the business service revenue growth faster than the overall and then implicitly consumer, is that something that you would expect to continue where this business is just going to be a bigger contributor to the wireless business going forward?

這很有幫助。而且我只是在想，即使在頂級服務收入方面，商業服務收入的增長速度也快於整體，然後是隱含的消費者，這是你期望在這項業務變得更大的地方繼續下去的事情未來無線業務的貢獻者？

I do expect that's going to be the case because, as we shared with you, we have a number of dynamics going on and our distribution strategies that have driven that. And this is -- we keep saying it, I'm not sure it's fully being processed that our stance in the market and how we're offering in the market is not just driven by a promotional device stance. This is partly driven by -- we have managed to shift our distribution strategy and approach into the market, and we're doing better in these segments. And these are not sales that are necessarily being driven by people walking into stores, taking an upgrade on a device.

我確實希望情況會如此，因為正如我們與您分享的那樣，我們有許多動態以及我們的分銷策略推動了這一點。這是 - 我們一直在說，我不確定我們在市場上的立場以及我們在市場上提供的方式不僅僅是由促銷設備立場驅動的。這部分是由於 - 我們已經設法將我們的分銷戰略和方法轉移到市場中，並且我們在這些領域做得更好。這些並不是由人們走進商店、對設備進行升級所推動的銷售。

And that's why our overall profitability dynamics are shifting in the way they have been. And we've been able to give you some visibility to how that's occurring. And when we're successfully taking share in the public sector under things like FirstNet, and when there's affinity dynamics that start to work into that and the households of first responders, and when we're more effective at tuning our distribution in the mid part of the market for business than where we've historically been, you are going to see faster growth for us in the business segment. And I think the results speak for themselves on what we're able to bring in relative to the balance of the industry on that.

這就是為什麼我們的整體盈利動態正在以以往的方式發生變化。我們已經能夠讓您了解這是如何發生的。當我們在諸如 FirstNet 之類的公共部門中成功佔有一席之地時，當親和力動態開始影響到該領域和急救人員的家庭時，以及當我們在中間部分更有效地調整我們的分配時業務市場比我們歷史上的水平，您將看到我們在業務領域的更快增長。而且我認為結果不言自明，說明我們能夠帶來什麼相對於行業的平衡。

And our next question comes from the line of Kannan Venkateshwar with Barclays.

我們的下一個問題來自巴克萊銀行的 Kannan Venkateshwar。

A couple, if I could. I mean, first, on the fiber side, we've seen penetration growth slow a little bit. Obviously, the absolute number keeps growing and accelerating every quarter sequentially. But then when we look at it in terms of penetration rate, I think it slowed a little bit versus what you were able to achieve last period. So it would be good to understand what the puts and takes there are and how we should expect that to evolve as we go forward.

一對，如果可以的話。我的意思是，首先，在光纖方面，我們已經看到滲透增長有所放緩。顯然，絕對數字每季度都在不斷增長和加速。但是當我們從滲透率的角度來看它時，我認為它與上一時期能夠實現的相比有所放緩。因此，最好了解其中的投入和產出，以及隨著我們的前進，我們應該如何期待它的發展。

And then, I mean, I guess, an associated question is the nonfiber decline rate is also accelerating. And so how much of the growth that we are seeing in fiber is on account of transfers from maybe the nonfiber side to the fiber side? And lastly, just Pascal, on the $20 billion free cash flow guide for next year, could you give us a sense of what kind of math or variables are being assumed for that guidance in terms of potential recessions or the growth environment in general?

然後，我的意思是，我想，一個相關的問題是非纖維的下降速度也在加快。那麼，我們在光纖方面看到的增長有多少是由於從非光纖端到光纖端的轉移？最後，帕斯卡，關於明年 200 億美元的自由現金流指南，您能否告訴我們在潛在衰退或總體增長環境方面，該指南假設了什麼樣的數學或變量？

So Kannan, let me take the first part of your question, and then I'll let Pascal do some cleanup here. So first of all, what you should expect is that, over the life cycle of a build -- and I think we've been pretty clear on giving you insights into this. Let's call it, the first 30% of penetration goes relatively quickly, and the next 20% takes a little bit longer. And so it would be natural that as we build, that when you kind of get yourself to a 30% penetration rate, you're going to see that curve start to slow down a bit, and that's to be expected.

所以 Kannan，讓我來回答你問題的第一部分，然後讓 Pascal 在這裡做一些清理工作。因此，首先，您應該期待的是，在構建的整個生命週期中——我認為我們已經非常清楚地為您提供了對此的見解。姑且這麼說吧，前 30% 的滲透速度相對較快，接下來的 20% 需要更長的時間。所以很自然，隨著我們的建設，當你讓自己達到 30% 的滲透率時，你會看到這條曲線開始放緩一點，這是意料之中的。

I think the biggest change that's occurred in penetration is how quickly we're getting to the 20% level versus historic numbers. And as we shared with you previously, we've kind of doubled our pace to penetration on the front end of that curve. And I've also shared with you that if you look at a typical return characteristic cash flow analysis of the investment of fiber, there are effectively 3 big things that drive that return dynamic and how effective the returns are, one of which is rate of penetration.

我認為滲透率發生的最大變化是我們以多快的速度達到 20% 的水平，而不是歷史數字。正如我們之前與您分享的那樣，我們已經將我們的步伐加倍，以滲透到該曲線的前端。我還與您分享，如果您查看光纖投資的典型回報特徵現金流分析，實際上有 3 大因素推動了回報動態以及回報的有效性，其中之一是滲透。

And when we did the original assumptions on kind of our fiber business case, we had a much more ratable and deliberate ramp into that first 30% of subscribers in the business case. And now what we managed to do is we managed to effectively take a year off the cycle to get to the 20% mark. That is a huge impact on accelerating cash flows to the front end of the business case.

當我們對我們的光纖業務案例進行最初的假設時，我們對業務案例中前 30% 的訂戶進行了更加可評價和刻意的提升。現在我們設法做到的是，我們設法有效地減少了一年的周期，以達到 20% 的大關。這對加速現金流流向業務案例前端產生了巨大影響。

And it has a meaningful impact on the characterization of returns, even if you don't increase the ultimate assumption of what the terminal penetration is. And so I would tell you, we've already kind of had success in that regard. We've characterized that for you. But we've not made any assumptions at that once you hit that 30% level that the back end is going to go any faster.

即使您不增加終端滲透率的最終假設，它也會對回報的表徵產生有意義的影響。所以我要告訴你，我們在這方面已經取得了一些成功。我們已經為您描述了這一點。但是，一旦您達到 30% 的水平，我們還沒有做出任何假設，即後端運行速度會更快。

And so I think you're going to see a degree of penetration slowdown as we kind of hit that 30%, and that's to be expected. It's been historic. And that doesn't mean it's a bad thing. It just takes a little bit longer to kind of get to what I would call as the market norm and kind of stability of how we expect shares to be allocated between the various players in the market.

所以我認為當我們達到 30% 時，你會看到一定程度的滲透率放緩，這是意料之中的。這是歷史性的。這並不意味著這是一件壞事。只是需要更長的時間才能達到我所說的市場規範和我們期望股票在市場上不同參與者之間分配方式的穩定性。

So hopefully, that gives you a little bit of sense on that. We don't publicly disclose the transfer rates and kind of what's going on there, Kannan. But look, you've got enough public information that we shared with you. I think you pretty well can conclude that if we're turning in the kind of numbers we're turning in, that there's got to be a meaningful percentage of that total fiber increase number that's coming from competitors in order to deliver the number.

因此，希望這能讓您對此有所了解。 Kannan，我們不會公開披露傳輸率和發生的情況。但是你看，我們已經與你分享了足夠多的公共信息。我認為您可以得出結論，如果我們要上交我們上交的那種數字，那麼來自競爭對手的總纖維增加數字中必須有一個有意義的百分比才能提供數字。

And we watch it. We track it closely. I think both are good, right? Because what we know that any customer we move from legacy or embedded infrastructure over to fiber becomes a new established long-term customer with us. They're not going anywhere once we get them on fiber.

我們看著它。我們密切跟踪它。我覺得兩個都不錯吧？因為我們知道，我們從傳統或嵌入式基礎設施轉移到光纖的任何客戶都會成為我們新建立的長期客戶。一旦我們使用光纖，它們就不會去任何地方。

But most importantly, we don't turn in the kind of numbers we communicated to you this quarter, unless we're doing something that's moving share in the market. And we all know where that share has to come from. It's coming from -- in almost all cases, the embedded cable provider.

但最重要的是，我們不會上交本季度與您交流的那種數字，除非我們正在做一些能夠推動市場份額的事情。我們都知道那份份額必須從哪裡來。它來自——在幾乎所有情況下，嵌入式有線電視提供商。

And Kannan, on free cash flow, as I said earlier, we're not updating our guidance for 2023. But what I did say, we're over 3/4 of the way through this year. And based upon our view of where the macros and all the potential risk, we expect this business to grow both earnings and free cash next year and for all the reasons I articulated earlier on.

Kannan，關於自由現金流，正如我之前所說，我們沒有更新我們對 2023 年的指導。但我確實說過，今年我們已經完成了 3/4。根據我們對宏觀環境和所有潛在風險的看法，我們預計這項業務明年的收益和自由現金將同時增長，這也是我之前闡述的所有原因。

And in terms of just the broader macros, look, we're not immune to them. But these businesses are generally more resilient even in an economic stress situation. So overall, I mean, that's -- we'll give you an update next year.

就更廣泛的宏而言，看，我們也不能倖免於難。但即使在經濟壓力的情況下，這些企業通常也更有彈性。所以總的來說，我的意思是——我們明年會給你一個更新。

Our next question comes from the line of Frank Louthan with Raymond James.

我們的下一個問題來自 Frank Louthan 和 Raymond James 的話。

With your success with wireless, I just wanted to be clear how you're thinking about the promotional activity going forward. Any need to back off some of that promotional activity? You're clearly seeing good strong margin improvement without that.

隨著您在無線方面的成功，我只是想弄清楚您對未來促銷活動的看法。是否需要取消一些促銷活動？如果沒有這個，您顯然會看到良好的利潤率改善。

And then I had a follow-up question on the fiber JV. I can appreciate you not wanting to comment on the story, but conceptually, would you be open to some outside investment to possibly reach some of those areas of your territory that aren't necessarily economical with your own capital going forward?

然後我有一個關於光纖合資企業的後續問題。我很感激你不想對這個故事發表評論，但從概念上講，你是否願意接受一些外部投資，以可能到達你所在領土的一些領域，這些領域不一定是經濟的，用你自己的資本前進？

Frank, thanks for asking the quarterly question on what's sustainable. It was sustainable for another quarter, and that's been 2.5 years now. And I'll let you know next quarter if it's 2 years, 2.75 years. So I feel really comfortable with where we are. I think you're seeing the strategy play out. I look at where the market sits today, and I'll reiterate what I said earlier in the call. We're not the one out there with $1,000 for new iPhones right now.

弗蘭克，感謝您提出關於可持續發展的季度問題。另一個季度是可持續的，現在已經有 2.5 年了。如果是 2 年，2.75 年，我會在下個季度告訴你。所以我對我們所處的位置感到非常自在。我認為您正在看到策略發揮作用。我看看今天的市場情況，我會重申我之前在電話會議中所說的話。我們不是現在有 1,000 美元購買新 iPhone 的人。

We are at a different place than I believe both of our primary competitors. And I also characterized for you, you need to understand a lot of our growth is not coming from what we have as offers that we're communicating in the market. Mike's question is a really important question, looking at the consumer business mix.

我們所處的位置與我認為的兩個主要競爭對手不同。而且我還為您描述了，您需要了解我們的很多增長並非來自我們在市場上傳達的報價。從消費者業務組合來看，邁克的問題是一個非常重要的問題。

And when we think about how we're spending our promotional dollars, I characterized for you in the Goldman conference that there's a lot of other aspects of promotion, how advertising gets done, how heavy you have to be to communicate your message.

當我們考慮如何花費我們的促銷資金時，我在高盛會議上為您描述了促銷的許多其他方面，廣告是如何完成的，您必須有多大的精力來傳達您的信息。

If you're doing a more promotional stance, what you have to do in your channels to incent people to sell and change things, the formula and the mix we have is a very competitive formula and mix right now across consumer and business, across our mix of promotional strategies or distribution partners. And one should not just simply say, because the lead offer that's being communicated in mass advertising is x, ask whether or not that's sustainable. The question is, are our customer acquisition costs sustainable? You're seeing the profitability improvement. You're seeing the ARPU improvement, and I think that's a pretty sustainable equation.

如果您正在採取更具促銷性的立場，那麼您必須在您的渠道中做些什麼來激勵人們銷售和改變事物，我們擁有的公式和組合是一個非常有競爭力的公式，並且現在在消費者和企業中，在我們的促銷策略或分銷合作夥伴的組合。而且人們不應該簡單地說，因為在大眾廣告中傳達的主要報價是 x，所以要問這是否可持續。問題是，我們的客戶獲取成本是否可持續？您正在看到盈利能力的提高。你看到了 ARPU 的提高，我認為這是一個非常可持續的方程式。

I'm not going to comment on the fiber JV structure. I will make an observation, Frank. It's my duty to always keep my mind open to new ideas. It's my responsibility in running the business that if there's an opportunity for us to do something that's in our wheelhouse, that's in the strength of the capabilities that we have as a company, and it's core and foundational to our brand to try to ensure that we seize those opportunities and move forward on them.

我不打算評論光纖合資企業的結構。我會做一個觀察，弗蘭克。我有責任始終保持對新想法的開放態度。我在經營業務時的責任是，如果我們有機會做我們自己的事情，那就是我們作為一家公司所擁有的能力，這是我們品牌的核心和基礎，努力確保我們抓住這些機會並繼續前進。

We certainly have a past practice. The wireless business was built with partners. I think you should understand and look back, and we've done that effectively in the past. And things that we've done, and we've done it in a responsible way for shareholders, and it's been a means for us to think differently about how footprint expansion can be done. We've certainly used that kind of an approach before. We understand how the approach works. I think about it in aspects to all kinds of elements of our business, and I've got to keep an open mind to those things moving forward.

我們當然有過去的做法。無線業務是與合作夥伴一起建立的。我認為你應該理解並回顧過去，我們過去已經有效地做到了這一點。我們所做的事情，我們以對股東負責的方式完成了它，這是我們以不同方式思考如何進行足跡擴張的一種方式。我們以前肯定使用過這種方法。我們了解該方法的工作原理。我從我們業務的各個方面考慮它，我必須對這些事情保持開放的態度。

And that question comes from the line of Walter Piecyk with LightShed.

這個問題來自 Walter Piecyk 與 LightShed 的對話。

John, when I look at postpaid, which is probably the prior focus on revenue for the company, you've increased revenue, or it's accelerated for the past 8 quarters. So I guess, when I look at the first part of that, you kind of referenced that in the last question, we were talking about how everyone was talking about the handset promotions. You saw very good subscriber growth, and that's sustained. And now when we look at the past year, it's been in part on price increases to some of the legacy plans.

約翰，當我查看後付費時，這可能是公司之前關注的收入，你已經增加了收入，或者在過去的 8 個季度中加速了。所以我想，當我看第一部分時，你在最後一個問題中提到了，我們談論的是每個人都在談論手機促銷。你看到了非常好的用戶增長，而且這種增長是持續的。現在，當我們回顧過去的一年時，部分原因是一些傳統計劃的價格上漲。

So now you've got to this, whatever, where you're 6% growth in postpaid. If you just sustain that going forward, that will probably beat consensus. You probably don't need to sustain it, but when you look at '23, is it going to be a component of more price increases? Or do you think subscribers are going to help you for growth in [Q3]?

所以現在你已經到了這個，無論如何，你的後付費增長了 6%。如果你只是堅持下去，那可能會超過共識。您可能不需要維持它，但是當您查看 23 年時，它會成為更多價格上漲的一部分嗎？或者您認為訂閱者會在 [Q3] 中幫助您實現增長嗎？

And my second question, which is related, is part of the ARPU increase for others was bundling in Netflix or, for your case, HBO Max, that you cut, and I think in June 1 for new customers. Maybe that's been helping your profitability, I don't know, but is there an opportunity to repack some of these streaming services into your offers in order to get ARPU even higher?

我的第二個問題是相關的，是其他人的 ARPU 增加的一部分是捆綁在 Netflix 中，或者，就你而言，HBO Max，你削減了，我認為是在 6 月 1 日為新客戶。也許這有助於您的盈利能力，我不知道，但是否有機會將其中一些流媒體服務重新打包到您的報價中以使 ARPU 更高？

So well, I appreciate the question. First of all, I think it's important when you look at the disclosures and what we've given you for the quarter. As you know, there's always some onetime things that pop into a given quarter that drive the numbers. I think your overall characterization is accurate, which is we're improving the yields of the revenue growth and what falls to the bottom line on EBITDA.

好吧，我很欣賞這個問題。首先，我認為當您查看披露以及我們在本季度為您提供的信息時，這一點很重要。如您所知，總是有一些一次性的事情會突然出現在特定的季度中，這些事情會推動這些數字。我認為您的總體描述是準確的，即我們正在提高收入增長的收益率以及 EBITDA 的底線。

I'm not going to suggest it's simply because we're going to get 6% revenue growth that we should expect that we're going to immediately get to 6% yields, but you've seen those yields improving each quarter. And we have a lot of confidence that, that's going to continue to occur, and it's consistent with the guidance that we've given moving through the balance of this year. And I think we have really good visibility for that improvement to happen. And there's a lot of factors that move into that, one of which is managing the cost structure more effectively.

我不會僅僅因為我們將獲得 6% 的收入增長，我們就應該期望我們將立即達到 6% 的收益率，但你已經看到這些收益率每個季度都在提高。我們非常有信心，這將繼續發生，這與我們在今年餘下時間提供的指導一致。而且我認為我們對這種改進有很好的認識。有很多因素會影響到這一點，其中之一就是更有效地管理成本結構。

In '23, look, I don't know exactly what the environment is going to be, and I'm not going to announce anything today in the market. We'll announce any of the changes we make in the market when it's time to change it. But when I look at the reality of the inflationary environment and understanding that in this kind of a rapid inflation environment, you need to manage the revenue side of the equation as well as you manage the cost side of the equation. The answer to that is yes. I think that's what a responsible management team does.

在 23 年，看，我不知道具體的環境會怎樣，而且我今天不會在市場上宣布任何事情。當需要改變市場時，我們會公佈我們在市場上所做的任何改變。但是當我看到通貨膨脹環境的現實並理解在這種快速通貨膨脹的環境中，你需要管理等式的收入方面以及管理等式的成本方面。答案是肯定的。我認為這就是一個負責任的管理團隊所做的。

Exactly what lever we choose to pull will be an artifact of the environment we find ourselves in. But I can assure you, the team has sat down. And as we've looked at planning and as we prepare to give you guidance for the year, we'll ensure that we have the right options and levers available to us to adjust to that. And as I said, we've got to work both sides of that equation. But I'm not going to tell you today that -- a preannounced set of tactics or strategies around that, especially on things that are relative to how we price in the market.

我們選擇拉動的確切槓桿將是我們所處環境的產物。但我可以向你保證，團隊已經坐下來了。當我們研究規劃並準備為您提供今年的指導時，我們將確保我們有正確的選擇和槓桿可供我們進行調整。正如我所說，我們必須在這個等式的兩邊工作。但我今天不會告訴你——一套預先宣布的策略或策略，尤其是在與我們在市場上定價相關的事情上。

On the content side, I don't think we've gotten any benefit, Walt, from content relative to the industry. We still have a lot of customers that get content bundled into their services, and we still view that as an important aspect of how we compete in the market. And as I think I shared last quarter, I would expect going forward that we'll have opportunities to incorporate content offerings in different ways into our portfolio.

在內容方面，沃爾特，我認為我們沒有從與行業相關的內容中獲得任何好處。我們仍然有很多客戶將內容捆綁到他們的服務中，我們仍然認為這是我們在市場上競爭的一個重要方面。正如我認為我在上個季度分享的那樣，我預計未來我們將有機會以不同的方式將內容產品整合到我們的產品組合中。

We still view our relationship with Warner Bros., Discovery and HBO Max as being an important one, and it's been valuable and effective for us. But there's also others that could be worthwhile and beneficial to us. We're adjusting our strategies as we move into '23. I think you'll see some things adjust and change as we do that. So I think I'd say stay tuned.

我們仍然認為我們與華納兄弟、Discovery 和 HBO Max 的關係很重要，它對我們來說很有價值和有效。但也有其他可能對我們有價值和有益的東西。隨著我們進入 23 世紀，我們正在調整我們的策略。我想你會看到一些事情隨著我們這樣做而調整和改變。所以我想我會說請繼續關注。

I think you're going to see content and ancillary services continue to be part of the wireless bundle in the industry moving forward. I think we'll play in a prudent fashion in our overall promotional dynamic, as I said earlier, managing effectively as part of that overall cost structure. And it will allow us to do a number of flexible things now that we don't necessarily have a captive content engine, so to speak, under the umbrella of AT&T.

我認為您將看到內容和輔助服務繼續成為行業向前發展的無線捆綁的一部分。正如我之前所說，我認為我們將在整體促銷動態中謹慎行事，作為整體成本結構的一部分進行有效管理。既然我們不一定有一個俘虜內容引擎，可以這麼說，在 AT&T 的保護傘下，它將使我們能夠做一些靈活的事情。

Thanks very much for the question, Walt. And thank you, everyone, for your participation and interest in AT&T. With that, we'll conclude the call and look forward to connecting again post our fourth quarter results.

非常感謝你的問題，沃爾特。感謝大家對 AT&T 的參與和關注。這樣，我們將結束電話會議，並期待在我們的第四季度業績後再次聯繫。

And ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation and for using AT&T Teleconference Special Services. You may now disconnect.

女士們先生們，今天的會議到此結束。感謝您的參與和使用 AT&T 電話會議特別服務。您現在可以斷開連接。