(Telecompaper) Time Warner Cable announced plans to increase its dividend 15 percent, after reporting a strong increase in net profit and cash flow for the fourth quarter. However, the cable operator continued to lose customers, shedding another 217,000 TV subscribers in the three months. TWC blamed the losses on its carriage dispute with CBS and said the customer trend improved month to month in the course of Q4 and January, and it was confident about the long-term outlook. Revenues for Q4 were up 1.7 percent year-on-year to USD 5.58 billion, and adjusted OIBDA rose 1.6 percent too USD 2.03 billion. EPS increased 12.5 percent to USD 1.89, helped by share repurchases. Capex was cut 8.5 percent to USD 827 million, helping free cash flow rise 31.7 percent to USD 773 million. Residential ARPU was up 2.2 percent from a year earlier to USD 106.03, driven by more customers on faster broadband plans. Customers taking speeds of at least 30 Mbps doubled year-on-year to 910,000. The total broadband base grew by 39,000 subscribers in three months to December to 11.089 million at year-end, almost equal to the TV base of 11.197 million customers. Telephony customers rose by 1,000 sequentially to 4.806 million at end-2013. The number of business customers rose by 18,000 in the three months to 624,000.