US telco AT&T has posted another huge quarter for its IPTV service 'U-verse TV', adding 208,000 subscribers in the fourth quarter of 2011 to reach a total of 3.8mn in service.

The company added that its margins for the service are improving thanks to increasing scale (the service is one of the very largest managed IPTV services in the world), and that profitability is increasing.

Its U-verse footprint now covers 30mn households, and penetration of eligible living units stood at 15.9% by the end of the year, with a penetration rate of 25% for areas marketed to for 36 months or more.

Around three-quarters of AT&T U-verse TV subscribers now take a triple- or quad-play package from the company, and Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) for U-verse triple-play customers was almost US$ 170 by the end of December 2011, up 2.5% year-on-year.

Total revenues across all operations for the fourth quarter of 2011 reached US$ 32.5bn, up 3.6% from one year previously, while the bottom line saw a net loss of US$ 6.7bn, compared to a net profit of US$ 1.1bn one year previously, with the losses attributed to significant charges which included the termination of the T-Mobile USA acquisition.