Sprint Preparing a Bid for T-Mobile US | Hacker News Reader

Sprint Preparing a Bid for T-Mobile US

online.wsj.com

9 pointsaclimatt14 comments

Hopefully it fails like the AT&T + T-Mobile acquisition!

Having 3 major carriers in the US instead of 4 is bad for rates. T-Mobile has been the first to introduce a few awesome service products (free int'l roaming data, unlimited data @ LTE speed, free data service for tablets).

When the last sale failed T-Mobile got a $3b breakup fee, maybe think they can do it again!

I don't even consider Sprint to be in the same league as AT&T and Verizon. They're basically a budget provider with bad coverage (but not nearly as bad as T-Mobile) and slower speeds than ATT/VZW where they do have coverage.

Too bad there isn't anyone Sprint could buy that would actually enhance their coverage. Outside of major metro areas it's pretty bad.

T-Mobile most definitely doesn't have as widespread coverage as AT&T or Verizon, however they do offer incredible speeds in the areas they do cover. Here's a Speed Test I ran on my Nexus 5 on LTE in Mountain View: http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/a/664985496

Also, I'm only paying $40 / month per line on T-Mobile with no-contract. I get Unlimited Calling/Messaging and 2.5GB of 4G Data.

Sprint's been rolling out LTE pretty comprehensively in the last few months. I upgraded my phone this week and was going to switch from them but discovered that my neighborhood in San Diego now has LTE even though it's not technically "launched" yet.

So far I'm happy with my choice, and with unlimited data on my phone it's a pretty great setup. No more having to download my spotify playlists to play offline anymore, can just stream as much as I want.

> Sprint's been rolling out LTE pretty comprehensively in the last few months.

It's been interesting reading statements like this over the past year. Sprint keeps announcing network expansions in small towns in flyover states but they're alienating the heck out of power users who live in actual cities in the midwest. Everyone I know in Ohio is in the process of switching away from them or is avoiding them like the plague. (I wouldn't dream of going back to them as a customer)

Just to clarify, I live in the middle of San Diego.

>>They're basically a budget provider with bad coverage (but not nearly as bad as T-Mobile)

I don't know where you're located, but in the Bay Area a pre-paid T-Mobile SIM card gets just as much, if not better, coverage than AT&T. I have a dual-SIM phone so I can watch the signal-strength of both the AT&T & T-Mobile on the same phone at the same time. When I get call-failed on the AT&T sim I can just dial out on SIM#2(T-Mobile) instead; flawless.

Please no... I had Sprint for many years and it was the worst, but inexpensive. I switched to T-Mobile a few months ago and love it.

There's an interesting dynamic in the industry. Sprint is hemorrhaging money and losing customers, ironically often to T-Mobile: http://newsroom.sprint.com/news-releases/sprint-nextel-repor..., http://www.dailytech.com/TMobile+Announces+Impressive+Quarte....

T-Mobile on the other hand seems to be on the upswing, but I'm not sure how long it can really last. Their new $70 unlimited data plan sounds great, but I can't figure out how they can possibly generate enough revenues to match Verizon and AT&T's capital investments into their networks. T-Mobile seems to be doing a decent job pulling together an LTE network, but it remains to be seen whether it continues to be solid once it starts getting loaded up, and whether they manage to keep pace as AT&T and Verizon invest in successive generations of technology.

I'm not sure what the business case would be for a T-Mobile/Sprint combination. I can see how it would be good for Sprint, but what does it buy T-Mobile?

Here's two links to the same story, as they cite the WSJ (and I can't get past their paywall)

http://www.theverge.com/2013/12/13/5208312/sprint-reportedly...

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/12/13/spri...

Hasn't it been something like a decade since Sprint was last profitable? How do they have the money to do this?

Deleted comment

That link doesn't actually bypass the paywall.

I had to plug that link into a Google search to get it to work.

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