Eerily mirroring the situation with T-Mobile in the UK, disgruntled Deutsche Telekom shareholders are apparently now turning their attention to the company's US outpost, now that the British woes are on the fast track to resolution thanks to a
tie-up with Orange. The
Financial Times is reporting that the bell isn't tolling quite yet for T-Mobile USA -- key players are still on board with the company's plan to get back into the game with an accelerated 3G rollout, which means that alternative strategies aren't actively being considered right this second. Word has it that the clock has been set for mid-2010, though, at which point red ink on the balance sheet is going to mean a more drastic change in direction -- something like a merger with Sprint or a move to transform the carrier into an ultra-value brand concentrating on prepaid service with a possible MetroPCS or Leap / Cricket buy. What color do you get when you combine magenta and yellow, anyway?
posted Sep 15th 2009 10:24PM
GOOD!!! Sprint is finally getting good, and is quickly turning into the best carrier in the country. T-Mob would probably put an end to that pretty quick.
Keep the revolution coming!!
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http://web.uvic.ca/sailingclub
Er, no. They still have crap phones. Not as bad as Verizon, but until they get something nicer or let me bring in a Korean CDMA phone (I'm talking about the good stuff they don't sell in America or only sold under Helio) I'm saying no.
@Jamar:
"Crap" phones? Please enlighten me because I seriously have no clue what the heck you're talking about.
Sprint much great phones.
To list just a few: Samsung Instinct S20, Blackberry Pearl/Curve/Tour, HTC Snap/Diamond/Touch Pro/Touch Pro2, Palm Pre/Treo, and with the inclusion of HTC Hero, Palm Pixi, the line up is just taking off.
Let me try again- crap non-smartphones. I don't want WinMo. Maybe Android, iPhone only because I won one for free in a raffle, but generally I don't like smartphones. I want to see some Hitachi or SE phones (seriously, look at what SE offers for the Japanese CDMA market). To me, the Samsung Instinct is no good. If SE released the Premier3 or the S001 for Sprint- THOSE are good phones.
Perhaps Deutsche Telekom should dump T-Mobile USA off to Vodafone, which could then in turn dump its 45% of VZW back into VZ... (and then VZ would probably end up selling its stake in Vodafone Italy, in a circular effect)
I'd sooner have them dump off to docomo (after all, they're planning to enter America, they need a network, right?). Nice phones and nice network services.
Or they could simply spin it off and do a stock offer and get listed on NASQAQ or AMEX. Blackstone ain't in it just to be in it; they will want their money back with growth, and no single-digit growth either.
No way would they buy out Leap or MetroPCS, for the same reason why Sprint is a bad choice: CDMA.
The better choice is to fill in the area of the US where they have limited GSM coverage: Alltel.
I say, spin it off with a stock offering, then buy Alltel.
"I say, spin it off with a stock offering, then buy Alltel."
Um.....you do realize that Alltel was primarily a CDMA carrier with only a tiny smattering of GSM coverage right?
More importantly....you do realize that Verizon Wireless ALREADY bought almost all of Alltel....like...a year ago?
Or were you talking about the little pieces left that had to be divested to allow the full deal to go through, that AT&T is rumored to be interested in acquiring?
i think sprint is pretty good itself. i dont know if i would really want another carrier to take it over and change things. I love sprint since i got the pre, coverage is great and so is speed.
Maybe im stupid.
Is T-Mobile just trying to buy a PART of Sprint, or just one of the pre-paid companies it owns?
Buy Sprint. You have to remember that T-Mobile USA is a subsidiary of the very large Deutsche Telekom based in Germany and exists all over Europe.
Do you guys do "What's in your bag" anymore? I want to see the contents of your bag Ziegler.
I'm pretty sure that T-Mobile is doing well; despite its smaller size and revenue, it remains one of DT's most profitable holdings. And it seems that the Financial Times report may not be that accurate: http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSWEA102120090915
Transforming into an ultra value brand and expanding 3g network sounds like the smartest move. Tmobile would buy out Cricket and other low cost carriers, instead of trying to take over a bigger company with more problems.
The low cost carrier business model wouldn't work on a national scale, though- there's a reason companies like metroPCS don't even try to cover outside of urban areas... (yes, this is the old "urban users subsidize rural users" system)
Tmo buying Sprint would be about as idiotic a move as Sprint buying Nextel. Here we are how many years later and Sprint is just NOW getting a handle on what to do with the Nextel network. Same would happen all over a gain with a Tmo purchase.
Not to mention the anti-trust issues taking the national carriers from four to three. There would also be far more barking bout international control of US wireless spectrum than when Bell Atlantic, GTE, AirTouch and Vodafone did the tie up to create Verizon.
it wouldn't have worked anyway since theres to much incompatible technologies between the two companies.
X2 would be the nextel merger all over again. They should sell nextel, i think thats the only network, thats more doody then Tmobile LOL.
It worked well enough in China; there are plenty of nice CDMA/GSM phones to go around now with dual-standby (CDMA and GSM running at the same time).
i like the "accelerated 3g rollout" II just 3g in my city, but its supper spotty, so i hope they fix that in my area....
LOL! Sprint, the forever fat chick at the prom without a date or an offer to dance. Sad...
Actually, Sprint is the fat chick in high school who later in life became hot.
@peestandingup:
+1
I honestly don't think buying Sprint is a smart move, for anyone. The company is just starting to organize itself in a profitable and consumer friendly company. Who wants to buy something that could unravel at any moment? Even if you don't think that could happen to Sprint, it could.
Deutsche Telekom is one of the largest carriers in Europe, I'd personally try to buy some of those good AT&T shares going around these days. It's not like they don't have the money, its just a question of where the money is.
Another horrible reason to buy a CDMA EV-DO carrier is that the successor UMB no longer exist, why would you want to buy something that's future will only last for maybe half a decade. (I'm looking at you Sprint too)
Considering that Nortel and Ericcson have just invented a way to let LTE fallback/handoff to EVDO gracefully and transparently, I would say they aren't all that concerned.
A technology generation transition period would be the perfect time to buy a carrier as you're upgrading your network already, you would just include them in your plans.
Docomo & Verizon
Sprint is a nice up and coming company for sale that has a nice prepaid division any offer above 100 mill will be considered.
Come to think of it Sprint has been losing money since they dropped Embarq actually maybe they should have kept it; at least that way money would still come in plus it probably has more customers than the wireless division now.
Hmm... Magenta and Yellow... doesn't that turn into brown...the color of crap? Anyway I'm a bit confused but from all we've been hearing T-Mobile US is supposedly one of the subsidiaries that is profitable but what do I know.
Buying out cricket or metro for tmobile would be an excellent idea apart from the whole gsm vs cdma confict. The outstanding thing is that, if you all remember, cricket and metro purchased tons of AWS spectrum a few years ago and it wouldnt be bad for tmobile to reinforce its current spectrum with more capacity for the future.
I like fat chicks, and Sprint!
Is Sprint really any good? Im thinking about switching by the end of the week from AT&T to Sprint
You know, from what I hear T-Mobile is pretty profitable. I wouldn't like to see them takeover Sprint by any means - it would be a horrible GSM/CDMA/iDEN/WiMAX mash up! I also like competition. It's what drove me to use T-Mobile anyway. Verizon was expensive, and locked out their phones features - so I left them. AT&T was a living nightmare for calls/dropped calls and overall call quality (and customer service was horrendous) - it was so bad I actually conned my way out of the contract. Sprint wasn't too bad, I didn't dig on CDMA too much though. Now T-Mobile had good call quality and awesome customer service, the only downside is coverage wasn't spectacular (though I have yet to have problems making calls in certain areas). Honest to god I can say that I have never dropped a call with TMO, calls are always clear, and although I have only had to deal with customer service a few times - they are pretty bitchin. Oh yeah, they actually welcome 3rd party apps on their handsets - hell, they'll even unlock your phone for free if you've been with them at least 90 days.
Anyway, I still like having some competish. It makes the world go round.
I thought money made the world go round.
I think it's a great idea. Sprint has been experimenting with LTE for quite some time now. They know they may have to make the switch someday, and it's apparently not that hard to make the switch from WiMax.T-Mo can take over Sprint and get rid of WiMax and go all out LTE, as Verizon and ATT are.
"What color do you get when you combine magenta and yellow, anyway?"
Android Green! ...Well sorta =P