TMo and VZW agree on spectrum swap if cable deal is approved

[supert0nes]

I would say that this increases T-Mobile's position a ton and Verizon's already strong position. Sprint, as we've been discussing all over the site is sitting pretty well for their current customer demand and not really demanding spectrum from the same bands as these other companies. They share PCS with a lot of other companies, but their position is strong and if they can gain more, then great!

 

I look for Sprint to hold steady with their spectrum + Clearwire for the foreseeable future, unless someone like Dish makes them an offer they can't refuse. I think it's a pretty huge investment in infrastructure and compatibility to add a new spectrum band, and Sprint already has to add 800 and 2600(Clearwire) as quickly as they can. For more Sprint spectrum discussion look over at at the discussion in the Network Vision forum as their position hasn't changed much by this.

[supert0nes]

Forgot to mention, but as stated in other places. AT&T is probably pushing a little bit to find new spectrum more than anyone else right now.

[pyroscott]

 

Sprint already wins with Clearwire because Clearwire has an abundance of spectrum.

 

I agree, Sprint has exactly what they want from clearwire right now. If sprint were to buy clearwire, they would end up with less money to pay for network vision and more spectrum than any other wireless provider. If the FCC didn't make them divest spectrum at the time of the purchase, they would certainly start enforcing the build out requirements of the spectrum. Sprint would end up losing spectrum, missing the boat on auctions for lower mhz spectrum, and you can kiss any pipe dreams of vzw or att wholesaling data capacity from Sprint's 2600mhz hot spots goodbye. There is little to no chance of those sharks strengthening the competition like that.

 

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[ericdabbs]

I agree, Sprint has exactly what they want from clearwire right now. If sprint were to buy clearwire, they would end up with less money to pay for network vision and more spectrum than any other wireless provider. If the FCC didn't make them divest spectrum at the time of the purchase, they would certainly start enforcing the build out requirements of the spectrum. Sprint would end up losing spectrum, missing the boat on auctions for lower mhz spectrum, and you can kiss any pipe dreams of vzw or att wholesaling data capacity from Sprint's 2600mhz hot spots goodbye. There is little to no chance of those sharks strengthening the competition like that.

 

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+1 on this. Sprint should not be in any rush to buy out Clearwire. Let Clearwire do their thing and finalize the TDD-LTE standard with the Global TDD alliance and build out the LTE network while Sprint focuses on Network Vision and improving balance sheet. Until Sprint can acquire just a bit more PCS spectrum (ahem H block), I think they will be sitting pretty.

 

My concern right now is when Clearwire LTE is available, what would Sprint devices's priority be in terms of LTE discovery? Is it 2500 MHz -> 1900 MHz -> 800 MHz OR is it 1900 MHz -> 800 MHz -> 2500 MHz? After all Sprint doesn't own the Clearwire LTE so they will have to be paying by the GB which means if they put 2500 MHz as highest priority and with 20 MHz channels, GB's of data will add up quick and Sprint will shell out more money but will provide capacity relief.

[pyroscott]

 

+1 on this. Sprint should not be in any rush to buy out Clearwire. Let Clearwire do their thing and finalize the TDD-LTE standard with the Global TDD alliance and build out the LTE network while Sprint focuses on Network Vision and improving balance sheet. Until Sprint can acquire just a bit more PCS spectrum (ahem H block)' date=' I think they will be sitting pretty.

 

My concern right now is when Clearwire LTE is available, what would Sprint devices's priority be in terms of LTE discovery? Is it 2500 MHz -> 1900 MHz -> 800 MHz OR is it 1900 MHz -> 800 MHz -> 2500 MHz? After all Sprint doesn't own the Clearwire LTE so they will have to be paying by the GB which means if they put 2500 MHz as highest priority and with 20 MHz channels, GB's of data will add up quick and Sprint will shell out more money but will provide capacity relief.[/quote']

 

That is concerning...

 

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[S4GRU]

My guess in LTE priority is 1900 > 800 > 2600. Since Sprint has to pay Clearwire for usage on the LTE network, they are going to make that the lowest priority. However, an ideal set up from a network standpoint is 2600 > 1900 > 800. Or even 1900 > 2600 > 800 would be fine.

 

Ideally, you want to protect the 800 capacity at all costs, so there is always a LTE signal for customers with poor in building coverage and at the edge of service. But if the 800 carrier is always full because Sprint is trying to minimize the number of customers being shunted to 2600, then there will not be enough capacity in the long run for the customers who would best benefit from 800MHz LTE service.

 

The LTE network has very good monitoring and control capabilities. It is possible that Sprint could reserve a certain capacity of the LTE 800 carrier. If they know they need 30% capacity for in building and edge of service customers in the cell, they can start shunting customers with good signals over to 2600 after reaching 70% capacity. They don't necessarily have to wait until the carrier is exhausted.

 

It will be quite remarkable in contrast to the old network management and controls. The network will know what kind of signal your device is getting and decide which carrier you are going to use based on the dynamic loads at any given moment. It's just a matter of setting it up correctly and monitoring it appropriately to make sure it is working they way it should. A lot of adjustment will be necessary to pull it off with the best performance.

 

Robert

[Fraydog]

AJ, the STL area is not part of the SpectrumCo deal. I'm pretty sure USCC holds AWS block B there. Other than that, nice breakdown.

[WiWavelength]

AJ, the STL area is not part of the SpectrumCo deal. I'm pretty sure USCC holds AWS block B there. Other than that, nice breakdown.

 

You are correct. St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Buffalo are the three major metros in which SpectrumCo did not win the AWS B block 20 MHz license (nor any other AWS spectrum). Cincinnati and Buffalo are depicted accurately on the chart, but I am not sure how St. Louis snuck in there. Thanks for the catch.

 

AJ

[WiWavelength]

My concern right now is when Clearwire LTE is available, what would Sprint devices's priority be in terms of LTE discovery? Is it 2500 MHz -> 1900 MHz -> 800 MHz OR is it 1900 MHz -> 800 MHz -> 2500 MHz? After all Sprint doesn't own the Clearwire LTE so they will have to be paying by the GB which means if they put 2500 MHz as highest priority and with 20 MHz channels, GB's of data will add up quick and Sprint will shell out more money but will provide capacity relief.

 

Let me start with a caveat. This explanation will be incomplete because even I do not know exactly how LTE network selection works. CDMA1X/EV-DO network selection is PRL guided, but that is not the case with LTE.

 

My guess is that Sprint TD-LTE capable devices will not be configured to seek out Clearwire TD-LTE 2600 independently. Rather, Sprint's LTE 1900/800 eNodeBs will have to redirect devices to TD-LTE 2600. And this will occur only once LTE 1900/800 carriers hit a certain percentage of their total capacity.

 

AJ

[dcshobby]

My guess in LTE priority is 1900 > 800 > 2600. Since Sprint has to pay Clearwire for usage on the LTE network, they are going to make that the lowest priority. However, an ideal set up from a network standpoint is 2600 > 1900 > 800. Or even 1900 > 2600 > 800 would be fine.

 

Ideally, you want to protect the 800 capacity at all costs, so there is always a LTE signal for customers with poor in building coverage and at the edge of service. But if the 800 carrier is always full because Sprint is trying to minimize the number of customers being shunted to 2600, then there will not be enough capacity in the long run for the customers who would best benefit from 800MHz LTE service.

 

The LTE network has very good monitoring and control capabilities. It is possible that Sprint could reserve a certain capacity of the LTE 800 carrier. If they know they need 30% capacity for in building and edge of service customers in the cell, they can start shunting customers with good signals over to 2600 after reaching 70% capacity. They don't necessarily have to wait until the carrier is exhausted.

 

It will be quite remarkable in contrast to the old network management and controls. The network will know what kind of signal your device is getting and decide which carrier you are going to use based on the dynamic loads at any given moment. It's just a matter of setting it up correctly and monitoring it appropriately to make sure it is working they way it should. A lot of adjustment will be necessary to pull it off with the best performance.

 

Robert

 

I know I asked a few months if we could get more details or an article about Sprint's new monitoring capabilities with Network Vision. Also, an article on backhaul was mentioned as well? Please or at least say we will get these two write-ups sometime in the future. Thanks

[keelerman8042]

• seen this article thought this was interesting http://www.androidpolice.com/2012/06/25/verizon-and-t-mobile-strike-agreement-to-swap-spectrum-t-mobile-reiterates-plans-for-lte-next-year/
  

[Josh]

This buying of spectrum does not hurt sprint barely at all, as they do not have, nor do they want any AWS spectrum...

Now this is me being hopeful, but if the DOJ decides that VZW still has too much spectrum after they allow t-Mobile to swap/purchase, maybe they will also allow Sprint to swap/purchase some PCS Spectrum.

Wishful thinking, I know, but as far as I know sprint does not have a nationwide band other than G in PCS. They have several different bands that all cover the US, but nothing contiguous. If VZW or any other company approached sprint with a swap deal, now would be the time as sprint is already updating their towers, they could re-align their spectrum as the new towers come online. I still hope that they can purchase the H block when it comes available, but they should keep their options open.

 

If Sprint owned as much 800 MHz spectrum as VZW owns of 700 MHz spectrum, this would not even be an issue discussed, but because there are 3 separate LTE signals that sprint will leverage, we are worried about the few times that it will be an issue.

 

There is a trade off between cost and network performance, and I remember seeing an article a few weeks ago stating that when people are at a baseball game its as hard to get a usable download speed as it is for a hitter to hit a Dickey knuckle-ball... it actually was not a sprint-bashing article surprisingly, and I think is the ideal thing for clearwire to focus its energy on first, in every city.

 

If clearwire was able to deploy their super fast TDD-LTE actually on the roof of stadiums and all other places where large crowds gather (convention centers, arenas, malls, bus & subway terminals, etc.) they would be in a great position to really sell their wholesale LTE services to other carriers. I know that the penguins have an app for their stadium that allows viewing instant replay of plays on your device, which is now only over wifi, but you can imagine that fans use their phones just as much at other games! Adding these sites first would free up the carriers spectrum to make sure they can handle phone calls and texts from those areas as well. Clearwire could then Spread out from these basic bottleneck's to other high usage urban areas downtown and then out into the suburban areas in a city, where it would make sense to stop.

 

Personally I don't agree that it would be a bad thing if sprint would purchase clearwire, if they become cheap enough. As they are already trading around $1, and sprint owns almost half of that anyway. But if this happens there is less hope of selling the service wholesale, which is a major potential revenue stream (albeit mainly from sprint right now). If Clearwire's capacity was included with sprint's native coverage area, it would allow sprint to actually compete with the cable co's even with video services to homes. They have such a great amount of bandwidth and would be able to fall back to the sprint network during rain or heavy usage periods, and still have no interruption in service.

Clearwire has so much spectrum that they would be able to crush the cable co's, and possibly partner with Google now that they want to offer video services through google play and google tv. Sprint could not only be on a comeback, but could eclipse all other providers (in an urban area) with their services, as well as provide decent mobile experience further into the country with their 800 MHz offerings. Then the configuration would truly be 2600>1900>800.

 

I know I got off topic, but some good food for thought.

[jefbal99]

Lots of text...

 

I honestly have no issue with the Verizon/TMobile spectrum swap, it just makes both of them stronger. I would hope this gives Sprint a stronger case for the nationwide PCS G block. Also, as AJ has noted in other threads, there are many markets where Sprint can add a 2nd PCS 5x5 LTE carrier with little effort.

 

As for Sprint purchasing Clear, I think it is a great long term plan, but short term, I don't think Sprint has the cash reserves to service its own debt, complete Network Vision, and take on the debt servicing and network build out of Clear. I'd like to see Sprint take over Clear in 2014 once the Sprint position has stabilized and Clear has built some of their network.

[Rawvega]

I honestly have no issue with the Verizon/TMobile spectrum swap, it just makes both of them stronger. I would hope this gives Sprint a stronger case for the nationwide PCS G block.

 

What do you mean? Sprint already has the nationwide PCS G block and is currently deploying LTE on it.

[jefbal99]

What do you mean? Sprint already has the nationwide PCS G block and is currently deploying LTE on it.

 

Damn typo, I meant the upcoming H block