US Cellular bye buy?

[Guest tuwsy]

I find this highly unlikely for various reasons

• $250 million in network investments for gear from Alcatel-Lucent & Nortel
• $500 million in internal billing system upgrades (which caused a shitstorm)
• Extremely healthy relationship with Sprint including preferred relationship & other goodies
• Carlson family owns 80+% of the company and the only way for a buyout is if the Carlson wants out or receives an offer that they cannot refuse.

I find it more likely that USCC & Sprint goes into a partnership and opens up LTE / EVDO roaming over their Cellular 850 & PCS in exchange for roaming on sprint SMR 800 & PCS LTE.

 

Side note - Just a FYI, USCC hardly uses any fiber or microwave backhaul. The vast majority of their sites utilizes bonded T1 or T3 copper lines due to their rural nature and many of them are bogging down due to smart phone use. This is the same type of backhaul that Sprint rejected from Centurylink down in NM and had to reopen bids for new backhaul that met NV requirements.

Would this be the same relationship sprint has with shentel?

[Guest tuwsy]

Will the cost of this buyout be part of the $8bi/year in investments?

[wyatt:-)]

If Sprint doesn't buy them, someone else will. Sprint customers who travel to Northern California (like myself) would be very happy.

 

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[Guest tuwsy]

I betcha sprint will allow the subs to keep their phones unlike with the spectrum buy.

[bigsnake49]

I am totally for this merger/buyout, just like I was for an Alltell/Sprint merger. These are customers that will most probably stay since the USCC network is very well developed in the rural areas they served. Plus now they will get access to better/more devices. Hopefully Sprint will use their SMR spectrum + USCC 850 in those areas they overlap. They might also develop USCC's 700MHz spectrum as well as develop roaming relationships with the rest of the rural 700Mhz holders. Channel 51 will be the first one to be auction off which will alleviate a lot of the interference concerns for Block A.

Edited August 15, 2013 by bigsnake49

[gnoj]

Also, until I see something more definitive this is just a silly rumor.

 

This. I was with USCC for 8 years before switching to Sprint, and the whole time I was hearing rumors they would be bought out. The two company's assets could complement each other perfectly and the whole world could be clamoring for a merger but unless the Carlson family have changed their minds (and I haven't seen any indication that they have), it's not going to happen.

 

It would be nice. My parents live in western Iowa and US Cellular and Verizon are the only options. They live in a huge coverage hole that used to be blanketed by Nextel.

 

Yes, coverage-wise this would greatly help Sprint compete with the twin bells on rural coverage (yes, that includes AT&T now that they've bought Long Lines), but they'd have to be prepared to spend more to upgrade backhaul and other equipment on their sites to bring them up to NV standards. I'm not a big fan of further consolidation in the industry though so I'd much prefer that Sprint either build out their own expanded network in IA, or arrange a partnership similar to what lilotimz described that doesn't deduct from the new 100MB roaming cap, or has a more generous cap.

[ChadBroChillz]

I am also for this merger, but only because I feel that it is either Sprint or the duopoly. I would much rather sprint gain rural coverage that see ATT/Verizon eat up competition to keep them on their pedestal.  

[Guest tuwsy]

I am also for this merger, but only because I feel that it is either Sprint or the duopoly. I would much rather sprint gain rural coverage that see ATT/Verizon eat up competition to keep them on their pedestal.

MegaSprint!

[Nickel]

I find it more likely that USCC & Sprint goes into a partnership and opens up LTE / EVDO roaming over their Cellular 850 & PCS in exchange for roaming on sprint SMR 800 & PCS LTE.

This is something I would like to see. Everybody wins in that scenario, Sprint would boost it's rural coverage and USCC would have access to Sprint's properly bachauled LTE and, to make AJ happy, It remains an independent company. 

[Guest tuwsy]

Why does it matter if one family owns us cell? Family or not, they care about money not legacy. It's not as if its "Carlson cellular"

[Conan Kudo]

Why does it matter if one family owns us cell? Family or not, they care about money not legacy. It's not as if its "Carlson cellular"

They've sold to VoiceStream before. Aerial Communications was the TDS' primary GSM venue (notwithstanding USCC Maine GSM). They could sell US Cellular to T-Mobile or Sprint. I suspect that a sale of US Cellular would be piecemeal. For example, the 700/850/AWS network would probably go to T-Mobile, while the 1900 network would go to Sprint (with maybe some swaps or whatever with T-Mobile for better contiguity and PCS block sanity).

[Guest tuwsy]

They've sold to VoiceStream before. Aerial Communications was the TDS' primary GSM venue (notwithstanding USCC Maine GSM). They could sell US Cellular to T-Mobile or Sprint. I suspect that a sale of US Cellular would be piecemeal. For example, the 700/850/AWS network would probably go to T-Mobile, while the 1900 network would go to Sprint (with maybe some swaps or whatever with T-Mobile for better contiguity and PCS block sanity).

TMO still wouldn't have enough A block to matter and when will the iphone support band 12?

[ChadBroChillz]

They've sold to VoiceStream before. Aerial Communications was the TDS' primary GSM venue (notwithstanding USCC Maine GSM). They could sell US Cellular to T-Mobile or Sprint. I suspect that a sale of US Cellular would be piecemeal. For example, the 700/850/AWS network would probably go to T-Mobile, while the 1900 network would go to Sprint (with maybe some swaps or whatever with T-Mobile for better contiguity and PCS block sanity).

 

I do not believe Sprint would be interested if it did not include USCC coverage and 850Mhz. PCS wise, USCC does not fill many gaps for Sprint after Chicago and other areas buyout. They could use it for swapping, but I do not believe that would make it worth the money for them.  I would be surprised if Sprint even let Tmobile get the 700Mhz, since they have stated that they will support 700Mhz A for roaming.  

 

 

  Also, didn't Tmobile already buy USCC's AWS?

[Rawvega]

I do not believe Sprint would be interested if it did not include USCC coverage and 850Mhz. PCS wise, USCC does not fill many gaps for Sprint after Chicago and other areas buyout. They could use it for swapping, but I do not believe that would make it worth the money for them. I would be surprised if Sprint even let Tmobile get the 700Mhz, since they have stated that they will support 700Mhz A for roaming.

Yes, that all makes sense imo.

 

 

Also, didn't Tmobile already buy USCC's AWS?

Yes, in the Mississippi Valley area. I'm not sure if that was the extent of uscc's AWS spectrum holdings.

 

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[Guest tuwsy]

I do not believe Sprint would be interested if it did not include USCC coverage and 850Mhz. PCS wise, USCC does not fill many gaps for Sprint after Chicago and other areas buyout. They could use it for swapping, but I do not believe that would make it worth the money for them. I would be surprised if Sprint even let Tmobile get the 700Mhz, since they have stated that they will support 700Mhz A for roaming.

 

 

Also, didn't Tmobile already buy USCC's AWS?

Please link to where sprint stated they'd support band 12.

[ChadBroChillz]

Please link to where sprint stated they'd support band 12.

 

 

 Specifically, Hesse said that Sprint is working on a solution that will allow LTE roaming across 850 MHz, 1900 MHz and 700 MHz spectrum. Sprint and C Spire have already completed intercarrier roaming tests. "We are working closely on a technical solution for intercarrier 4G roaming between our network and others," Hesse  said.

 

http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/sprint-teams-c-spire-lte-roaming/2013-04-18

 

Hesse said the carrier has begun to work on providing specifications that would allow for roaming between the carrier’s current LTE service running in the 1.9 GHz band and those of carriers that are looking to rollout LTE services in the 700 MHz, 850 MHz and 1.9 GHz bands. A Sprint Nextel spokesman added that the 700 MHz support would include the lower A-, B- and C-Bands, also known as Band Class 12. The move would seem to be good news to a number of rural carriers that have been unable to garner device or equipment support for their lower 700 MHz spectrum as well as allow Sprint Nextel to tap into potential coverage provided by rural carriers that can begin rolling out LTE services in those bands.

http://www.rcrwireless.com/article/20130418/carriers/cca-spring-2013-sprint-nextel-moves-enable-lte-roaming/ 

[Guest tuwsy]

http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/sprint-teams-c-spire-lte-roaming/2013-04-18

 

http://www.rcrwireless.com/article/20130418/carriers/cca-spring-2013-sprint-nextel-moves-enable-lte-roaming/

That's roaming between bands. He meant that carriers with phones with band 12 are going to be able to roam onto sprint's band 25/26 if they include sprint's bands , not that sprint is going to graciously going to include band 12 on its own phones to help out the smaller carriers.

[lynyrd65]

Source please. Unless sprint is gonna buy out the rest of A block, this doesn't pass the smell test.

I'm pretty sure we've already had this talk maxi

 

but lest you forgot skip to 16:15 in this address

 

[Guest tuwsy]

I'm pretty sure we've already had this talk maxi

 

but lest you forgot skip to 16:15 in this address

 

He talked about inter carrier roaming on multiple bands. He did not say sprint would be supporting those bands in its own phones.

He simply means: if c spire subs are on 700 a block and they move into a sprint coverage area with band 25, they'll be roaming on sprint's LTE. That's it.

[Conan Kudo]

He talked about inter carrier roaming on multiple bands. He did not say sprint would be supporting those bands in its own phones.

He simply means: if c spire subs are on 700 a block and they move into a sprint coverage area with band 25, they'll be roaming on sprint's LTE. That's it.

Since C Spire already uses Band 25 for its PCS A-F holdings, that's not even an issue. C Spire has yet to build out a Band 12 network.

[supert0nes]

They've sold to VoiceStream before. Aerial Communications was the TDS' primary GSM venue (notwithstanding USCC Maine GSM). They could sell US Cellular to T-Mobile or Sprint. I suspect that a sale of US Cellular would be piecemeal. For example, the 700/850/AWS network would probably go to T-Mobile, while the 1900 network would go to Sprint (with maybe some swaps or whatever with T-Mobile for better contiguity and PCS block sanity).

 

 

What kind of precedent is there for piecemeal sales?  US Cellular really has a spectrum portfolio that fits with all the national carriers combined.

[Conan Kudo]

What kind of precedent is there for piecemeal sales?  US Cellular really has a spectrum portfolio that fits with all the national carriers combined.

Does there need to be a precedent? That said, Alltel was an example of piecemeal sales. It was broken up and split among AT&T, Verizon, and ATNI. Of course, now ATNI is selling those assets to AT&T, so it's really AT&T and Verizon.

[Guest tuwsy]

Since C Spire already uses Band 25 for its PCS A-F holdings, that's not even an issue. C Spire has yet to build out a Band 12 network.

I was making a point that sprint will not be telling apple to put in band 12 in the iPhones. Ever.

[lynyrd65]

He talked about inter carrier roaming on multiple bands. He did not say sprint would be supporting those bands in its own phones.

He simply means: if c spire subs are on 700 a block and they move into a sprint coverage area with band 25, they'll be roaming on sprint's LTE. That's it.

Sure thing max

 

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[RCM]

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