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Sprint Reportedly Bowing Out of T-Mobile Bid (was "Sprint offer" and "Iliad" threads)


thepowerofdonuts

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Sprint is cheaper by $56.01 over a 24 month period. Now if Son promises to keep T-Mobile's pricing structure in tact as part of the merger, how is that actually saving anyone money?

 

I realize there are certain cases where T-Mobile may be cheaper, but if the cost differences aren't that significant, what's the gain in adopting T-Mobile's cost structure?

 

T-Mobile has different packages, different plans.

 

Don't include the scammy insurance when comparing, its a scam, don't fall for it from any cel company please.

 

Softbank costs about twice as much as cell plans here in the US, so don't believe anything he says either.

The Japanese cell market is closed to tourists, I feel until their market is open, a Japanese company should be allowed to start here.

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Wow. Its kind of funny how just a few weeks ago all the tech blogs were buzzing about T-Mobile being cheaper than everybody else. Now that the intent to merge Sprint and T-Mo has all but been announced somebody takes a really close look and comes to the conclusion that T-Mo can be more expensive? Yeah ok. That opinion is totally unbiased.  :td:

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I wonder what happens to my precious Ting under this plan for Softbank USA?

 

I don't really have a problem with joining a Framily plan and my Nexus 5 should work great seeing as it supports T-Mobile and Sprint already. It is a bit sad if they go away though because the service has been great and the customer service is top notch.

 

I kind of like the market we have now with many small MVNO players trying to carve out a niche but I see the logic in a combined T-Mobile/Sprint really taking on AT&T and Verizon.

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I wonder what happens to my precious Ting under this plan for Softbank USA?

 

I don't really have a problem with joining a Framily plan and my Nexus 5 should work great seeing as it supports T-Mobile and Sprint already. It is a bit sad if they go away though because the service has been great and the customer service is top notch.

 

I kind of like the market we have now with many small MVNO players trying to carve out a niche but I see the logic in a combined T-Mobile/Sprint really taking on AT&T and Verizon.

Why wouldn't Softbank USA keep the mvno program that Sprint established. They own Virgin and Boost, not Ting.

 

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Why wouldn't Softbank USA keep the mvno program that Sprint established. They own Virgin and Boost, not Ting.

 

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Yeah but if Softbank acquires T-Mobile and goes to a full no contract plans why would Sprint have a need for any MVNOs, really? As it is if I moved to a Framily plan with 7 or more people it is only $15/mo more with taxes higher than my Ting bill. I mean why even bother with Straight talk @ $45/mo when you can get unthrottled unlimited at Sprint for the same price?

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Yeah but if Softbank acquires T-Mobile and goes to a full no contract plans why would Sprint have a need for any MVNOs, really? As it is if I moved to a Framily plan with 7 or more people it is only $15/mo more with taxes higher than my Ting bill. I mean why even bother with Straight talk @ $45/mo when you can get unthrottled unlimited at Sprint for the same price?

If phone prices go cheap enough, then there will be no need for MVNO's. And of course, that banks on everyone qualifies for phone financing too.

 

 

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I personally don't believe the FCC/DOJ would be keen on doing away with MVNO's.  I don't think they are going anywhere in the short term.  All the providers seem to like them.  The margins must do pretty well to continue with MVNO's.

 

Robert

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Ok so if the merger actually goes through, is sprint going to continue with CDMA? Or will be a hybrid of both or just go with GSM? If this is somewhere as a thread someone point me in the right direction. Thanks!

 

 

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Ok so if the merger actually goes through, is sprint going to continue with CDMA? Or will be a hybrid of both or just go with GSM? If this is somewhere as a thread someone point me in the right direction. Thanks!

 

 

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More than likely the GSM/CDMA networks will remain separate and operational and the combined company will start moving everyone to LTE. Sometime in the future after VoLTE the legacy networks will be shut off completely.

 

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More than likely the GSM/CDMA networks will remain separate and operational and the combined company will start moving everyone to LTE. Sometime in the future after VoLTE the legacy networks will be shut off completely.

 

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They will have to leave the two networks up for a while for legacy devices and M2M even if they move every voice customer off of them.

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They will have to leave the two networks up for a while for legacy devices and M2M even if they move every voice customer off of them.

That's why I said sometime in the future.

 

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

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Yeah but if Softbank acquires T-Mobile and goes to a full no contract plans why would Sprint have a need for any MVNOs, really? As it is if I moved to a Framily plan with 7 or more people it is only $15/mo more with taxes higher than my Ting bill. I mean why even bother with Straight talk @ $45/mo when you can get unthrottled unlimited at Sprint for the same price?

 

Sprint enjoys* working with their MVNOs to help them succeed for a couple reasons. First, the margins are quite good. Sprint doesn't sell "unlimited" anything to an MVNO, even if that company turns around and resells an unlimited service. That MVNO has to pay a flat per-min/SMS/MB rate to Sprint. If a retail customer takes their unlimited minute or data allotment to heart, Sprint's still only going to get the same flat amount from them every month.

 

Additionally, studies have been done that show that a significant portion of Sprint's MVNO customers have left from or would move to AT&T or Verizon rather than Sprint retail. Ting themselves did one such analysis based on port-ins. The original posting was pulled for whatever reason at Sprint's request, but is still available here. Regarding the risk of port-outs from their postpaid base, Sprint's Matt Carter put it this way: "Are you enabling them to steal subscribers from you? If we didn't do this, someone else would...So you might as well eat your own. You should cannibalize yourself."

 

Even if both of these people are replaced by their T-Mobile counterparts, I doubt they'd feel much differently, since TMUS also has their own very active wholesale division.

 

So I don't think there's much of a question regarding whether Sprint has a want or need for MVNOs. Given the competitive pricing of the new no-contract Framily plans, I believe it's more a question of whether customers will have much of a need to seek out MVNOs.

 

Since we are both familiar with them, I'll use Ting as an example (assumes 7+ member Framily, since that is not too difficult to cobble together or join):

 

1GB of data is $25 including the device fee. That price includes no voice or SMS usage. For the same price, Sprint provides the same amount of data (including 100MB while roaming) + unlimited voice and text.  As someone who uses around 1GB of mobile data a month (usage which I consider on the light side) but very few calls, Ting was a very good option before Framily, but not so much anymore. For my mother, who prefers a simple flip phone and has an unlimited VoIP line at home (so no data and few calls/texts), Ting still makes sense, especially since it includes all the same voice roaming as Sprint postpaid. Her bill runs between $9-18/mo + tax.

 

That is still a savings, but if Sprint offered a no-data option for ~$15, or even better, offered the option to pool her 1GB of data (so I could use all 2GB; I certainly wouldn't want shared data plans forced on everyone), we'd both be on Framily. Once you move up to the 3GB or Unlimited tiers, it becomes pretty much a blowout in Sprint's favor.

 

If a merger happens and SoftBank revisits Framily to make some changes (like they're currently doing in Japan), I hope they consider those ideas, in addition to maintaining a low-minute/high-data option like T-Mobile's $30 100min/5GB plan for single-lines that can't/don't want to try to expand their Framily. That + free international roaming would really undercut most MVNOs.

 

In the face of such pricing, MVNOs will have to offer and emphasize unique features (i.e. Freedompop's freemium plans, Republic's smooth hand-off between cellular and Wi-Fi, Ting's account management tools and customer service) to survive. Unless SoftBank completely changes course and decides to hinder rather than help them, this should actually make the MVNO market more streamlined and interesting going forward.

 

*Apparently she thinks Sprint still has a 2G network... :wall:

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They will have to leave the two networks up for a while for legacy devices and M2M even if they move every voice customer off of them.

Yup.... Remember the timeline to convert or really just fully shut off Nextel to allow NV deployments?..... Given most of those users were companies for the 2way, it was a long process to allow those to transition over to new devices....

 

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Is it just me... Or is T-Mobile actually more expensive in certain use cases like Unlimited over Sprint?

 

I calculated it compared to Sprint and this is what I came up with for unlimited. T-Mobile and Sprint iPhone 5S 16 GB are used as the comparison devices to keep things as fair as possible.

 

T-Mobile

 

Simple Choice Unlimited: $80

Jump! and insurance: $10

iPhone 5S EIP: $27 for 24 months

SIM card: $10 up front.

 

Total: $117 per month for 24 months. 24 month cost: $10 up front + (117x24) = $2818

 

Sprint

 

Framily Plan plus Unlimited and Yearly Upgrades: $75

iPhone 5S EasyPay: $27.09 for $23 months, $26.92 for the 24th month

Total Equipment Protection Plus: $13

 

Total: $115.09 for 23 months, 24th month $114.92. Total: $2761.99

 

Sprint is cheaper by $56.01 over a 24 month period. Now if Son promises to keep T-Mobile's pricing structure in tact as part of the merger, how is that actually saving anyone money?

 

TL/DR : After merger, if T-Mobile's plans are kept going forward, T-Mobile's plans will save money for everyone except those people on Sprint who use more than 5GB, since they aren't paying for that extra usage due to weirdness in how Sprint delineates their plans.

 

I'm not sure it's fair to assume that T-Mobile's "True Unlimited" is 100% comparable to Sprint's "Unlimited" plan.

 

I don't want to re-hash that whole thread here, but based on the "5GB soft cap then lower priority" changes, Sprint's plan feels indeterminately below T-Mobiles "7-9GB+ True Unlimited" but indeterminately above T-Mobile's "5GB soft cap then throttle" in terms of data allotment. 

 

If you redo the numbers at 5GB on either carrier, T-Mobile becomes cheaper. (107 per month, compared to Sprint's 115 per month). This isn't totally fair, since Sprint lets you go over that with faster speeds than T-Mobile does, but it seems no more unfair than comparing Sprint Unlimited to T-Mobile Unlimited, since T-Mobile has no "5GB than priority" baked into that plan, and Sprint does.

 

I think the difference here isn't really between carriers, but between plans. Sprint's plan assumes unlimited users are (primarily) entitled to the 5GB range, where T-Mobile's plan assumes the unlimited users are entitled to a number closer to 7-10GB range. The $10 price difference between the plans seems to indicate this.

 

You'll almost certainly never see T-Mobile talk about a "5GB soft limit" metric on their Unlimited plan the way Sprint did, because they already offer a 5GB plan, and Unlimited is more money. The fact that Unlimited users on T-Mobile are assumed to use more data than Sprint Unlimited users are permitted, appears to be baked into their pricing already.

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TL/DR : After merger, if T-Mobile's plans are kept going forward, T-Mobile's plans will save money for everyone except those people on Sprint who use more than 5GB, since they aren't paying for that extra usage due to weirdness in how Sprint delineates their plans.

 

I'm not sure it's fair to assume that T-Mobile's "True Unlimited" is 100% comparable to Sprint's "Unlimited" plan.

 

I don't want to re-hash that whole thread here, but based on the "5GB soft cap then lower priority" changes, Sprint's plan feels indeterminately below T-Mobiles "7-9GB+ True Unlimited" but indeterminately above T-Mobile's "5GB soft cap then throttle" in terms of data allotment. 

 

If you redo the numbers at 5GB on either carrier, T-Mobile becomes cheaper. (107 per month, compared to Sprint's 115 per month). This isn't totally fair, since Sprint lets you go over that with faster speeds than T-Mobile does, but it seems no more unfair than comparing Sprint Unlimited to T-Mobile Unlimited, since T-Mobile has no "5GB than priority" baked into that plan, and Sprint does.

 

I think the difference here isn't really between carriers, but between plans. Sprint's plan assumes unlimited users are (primarily) entitled to the 5GB range, where T-Mobile's plan assumes the unlimited users are entitled to a number closer to 7-10GB range. The $10 price difference between the plans seems to indicate this.

 

You'll almost certainly never see T-Mobile talk about a "5GB soft limit" metric on their Unlimited plan the way Sprint did, because they already offer a 5GB plan, and Unlimited is more money. The fact that Unlimited users on T-Mobile are assumed to use more data than Sprint Unlimited users are permitted, appears to be baked into their pricing already.

There's no 5GB and then priority in place. Sprint doesn't lower your network priority simply because you hit 5GB. If the top 5% are using 10GB on average and you have only used 5GB, your not getting "throttled".

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Why does everyone think that tmobile will not throttle people if they have too...AT the bottom, in fine print. 

 

"Network Management: Service may be slowed, suspended, terminated, or restricted for misuse, abnormal use, interference with our network or ability to provide quality service to other users, or significant roaming."

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There's no 5GB and then priority in place. Sprint doesn't lower your network priority simply because you hit 5GB. If the top 5% are using 10GB on average and you have only used 5GB, your not getting "throttled".

Do you know of anyone that has been throttled? I am still curious to see if sprint is actually throttling people above 5gb this month or if they raised the limit after much consumer complaint.

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TL/DR : After merger, if T-Mobile's plans are kept going forward, T-Mobile's plans will save money for everyone except those people on Sprint who use more than 5GB, since they aren't paying for that extra usage due to weirdness in how Sprint delineates their plans.

 

I'm not sure it's fair to assume that T-Mobile's "True Unlimited" is 100% comparable to Sprint's "Unlimited" plan.

 

I don't want to re-hash that whole thread here, but based on the "5GB soft cap then lower priority" changes, Sprint's plan feels indeterminately below T-Mobiles "7-9GB+ True Unlimited" but indeterminately above T-Mobile's "5GB soft cap then throttle" in terms of data allotment...

 

That "weirdness" derives from the fact that TMUS raised the price of Unlimited by $10 and inserted a new 5GB tier after the Framily plans were developed and launched. Using the cheapest per-line price possible for Unlimited everything, Sprint is $45. Originally, that was $42 with TMUS, now it is $52. I'm sure if Sprint could take the Framily plans back and re-launch them, they'd have also mimicked TMUS's 4-tier setup. T-Mobile likely raised that price because they need the money to help fund the new and long overdue plan of bringing LTE to their 2G-only sites, and it makes sense to first ask your extreme data users to pay for that.

 

And no, the plans aren't comparable, because Sprint offers better LTE coverage for what is now (ironically) a slightly lower price. Sprint is not using a throughput throttle, only a latency one, and that is only for the top 5% of users on congested sites. It is not firmly set to kick in at 5GB - it is a deliberately flexible policy. As average data usage increases, so will the point where this network management kicks in. As network capacity improves through the addition of B26, B41, refarmed PCS spectrum, and installation of small cells, the number of sites where this will even matter will dwindle. As Mr. Shaw has pointed out, T-Mobile also "throttles" (aka uses network management), but they've chosen to be a bit more vague/opaque about it.

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*Apparently she thinks Sprint still has a 2G network... :wall:

In her defense 1x is often referred to as 2G, just like LTE is referred to as 4G even though it doesn't meet the requirements to be a 4G technology.

 

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Do you know of anyone that has been throttled? I am still curious to see if sprint is actually throttling people above 5gb this month or if they raised the limit after much consumer complaint.

I haven't been throttled at all and I use around 5GB of data each billing period. In general though, speeds haven't improved by much but latency certainly has on many of the sites that I'm on. I've seen it drop from 56ms to 34ms.

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Going from 56ms to 34ms in latency doesn't translate that much into a speed boost, now going from say for example 250ms or more down to 34ms, now that would be a boost. A ping 100ms or less is a good ping because basically you are talking a tenth of a second or less. That goes for any data especially for online gaming.

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I haven't been throttled at all and I use around 5GB of data each billing period. In general though, speeds haven't improved by much but latency certainly has on many of the sites that I'm on. I've seen it drop from 56ms to 34ms.

I have also noticed the pings have improved. I am wondering where all of these articles claiming sprint has the highest ping times. I just looked through multiple speed tests from the past month and a month back. Every single ping test except for 2 (and excluding 3g) was below a ping of 60. Average was around 45 and lowest was 34.

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