T-Mobile CFO makes case for U.S. consolidation, Sprint deal

[tongboy]

No, other GSM based providers do still exist. However, the only one in a major market is Cincinnati Bell.

 

AJ

Thanks for correcting me AJ. Schooled by the master!

 

Does T-Mobile have the same roaming restrictions in those areas they have on AT&T's footprint?

 

Sent from my HTCONE using Tapatalk

 

 

[WiWavelength]

Does T-Mobile have the same roaming restrictions in those areas they have on AT&T's footprint?

 

I cannot speak to the extent of its agreement with Cincinnati Bell, but T-Mobile has many wide open roaming agreements with smaller, rural GSM based operators.

 

AJ

[bigsnake49]

yes, I will give you that one. Florida is particularly sad spot for Sprint.

 

The Miami area is actually not bad for Sprint. Now they have not finished their LTE builds, but they should be OK by the middle of next year. I hope they don't use 800MHz for skimping on putting 1900MHz LTE on every PCS site that Verizon is on. Thicken your network in Florida, Sprint!

[S4GRU]

Give credit where credit is due. I appreciate all of sprint's hard work to make a world class network, but t-mobile did good with planning early on their backhaul. Plus, they have a lot of great Spectrum in the 1900 band. A marriage might not be too bad.

 

I don't appreciate baseless fanboy comments either. See today's side by side comparison:

 

http://www.s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/3420-T-Mobile-LTE-&-Network-Discussion&do=findComment&comment=226074

 

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Let's also paint a realistic picture of Tmo's backhaul. They only upgraded backhaul over about only 30% of their geographic service area. The cities only. And not even the area around cities. Sometimes completely missing suburbs and exurbs.

 

And also, many Tmo LTE sites have backhaul that is not quite robust enough for existing WCDMA traffic. And they just connected LTE to it. So I have encountered many Tmo LTE sites with little to no traffic, 10MHz channels, full signal and getting 3-5Mbps.

 

Also, AWS LTE should only be used as an overlay. Because of the site spacing, many places Tmo LTE is a bunch of islands. Even slightly worse than LTE 1900. And indoor coverage is non existent more than 1/4-1/2 mile from a Tmo LTE site.

 

And the final thing is that there are a lot of sites not upgraded within their launch cities. Just the same as Sprint. But they don't get called out for it.

 

Tmo LTE is pretty nice, especially where they have really robust backhaul. I smile those few times I get 50Mbps speeds (which has been on only 3 of about 200 sites I've used). And Tmo is a good carrier for some people. But Sprint's is also a viable carrier for many people. And Sprint's position in 15 months is much better than Tmo. Without any significant changes to Tmo's plans, it's going to get tougher and tougher for them.

 

But the exuberence for Tmo will be painted in the correct light here at S4GRU. It's why I have all four carriers. So I can have an honest dialog about them all.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

[Conan Kudo]

And the final thing is that there are a lot of sites not upgraded within their launch cities. Just the same as Sprint. But they don't get called out for it.

T-Mobile doesn't get called on it largely because it's not that noticeable to its subscribers. The reason it was noticeable with Verizon and Sprint is that the fallback is very painful. AT&T and T-Mobile both offer a superior fallback experience, and they actively work to improve performance on both levels of the network. 

 

HSPA+21 and HSPA+42 can provide a substantially better experience than EvDO Rev A. If Rev B was deployed, maybe that might be a different story, but EvDO is an dead-end product anyway.

[Fraydog]

Let's also paint a realistic picture of Tmo's backhaul. They only upgraded backhaul over about only 30% of their geographic service area. The cities only. And not even the area around cities. Sometimes completely missing suburbs and exurbs.

 

And also, many Tmo LTE sites have backhaul that is not quite robust enough for existing WCDMA traffic. And they just connected LTE to it. So I have encountered many Tmo LTE sites with little to no traffic, 10MHz channels, full signal and getting 3-5Mbps.

 

Also, AWS LTE should only be used as an overlay. Because of the site spacing, many places Tmo LTE is a bunch of islands. Even slightly worse than LTE 1900. And indoor coverage is non existent more than 1/4-1/2 mile from a Tmo LTE site.

 

And the final thing is that there are a lot of sites not upgraded within their launch cities. Just the same as Sprint. But they don't get called out for it.

 

The 30% figure is from where? Got a link? 

 

T-Mobile doesn't get called on it largely because it's not that noticeable to its subscribers. The reason it was noticeable with Verizon and Sprint is that the fallback is very painful. AT&T and T-Mobile both offer a superior fallback experience, and they actively work to improve performance on both levels of the network. 

 

HSPA+21 and HSPA+42 can provide a substantially better experience than EvDO Rev A. If Rev B was deployed, maybe that might be a different story, but EvDO is an dead-end product anyway.

 

Also, I remember you pointing out that WCDMA is operating off higher power levels on modernized sites (about 25,000 of T-Mobile's sites by what I can tell).  I've seen the coverage drastically improve in short testing of T-Mobile's network in Saint Louis. There's still a few dicey areas in the more rural parts of the Metro East but it's 100% better than it was. 

 

The more I think of it the more I'm on the same page as big snake. The two companies should merge, rally around 3GPP technologies, and divest spectrum to Dish Network for Dish to be a 4th competitor, then upgrade T-Mobile rural areas around the new standards. This would also give the new Sprint time to flush Alcatel-Lucent out of their networks over time, and would give them a brilliant network team.  

 

I've said that Hesse should remain CEO of the combined company. That said, I'd like to see Legere stay around as COO, and Neville Ray be the CTO of the combined company. 

 

For those worried about CDMA, the combined company could run both technologies over Network Vision cells, it just wouldn't be the focus of sales anymore.  CDMA still has uses for legacy customers and M2M. It just wouldn't show up in new smartphone handsets at a certain point. VoLTE would be used on the old Nextel spectrum for voice as much as data. TD-LTE would be the spectrum big gun along with AWS LTE. 

[Fraydog]

2nd post on this... it would still be branded Sprint but if SoftBank wanted to rebrand theirs, they could do that as well. I'd stick with Sprint, obviously T-Mobile would not be a branding option, nor would the magenta color as those are properties of DT.

[bigsnake49]

This little dance of the T-Mobile executives and the Sprint executives dancing around a merger has gone on for a little while. I don't know what the timing of it should be. Maybe after Sprint has finished NV? After they stop losing customers? After the stock recovers?

[Fraydog]

This little dance of the T-Mobile executives and the Sprint executives dancing around a merger has gone on for a little while. I don't know what the timing of it should be. Maybe after Sprint has finished NV? After they stop losing customers? After the stock recovers?

Sooner is better in my book.

[S4GRU]

The 30% figure is from where? Got a link?  

Don't preach to me about documentation. Yeah, I got a link. It's called the Tmo coverage map. To my eye, it looks like geographically over their coverage area, only about 1/3 of it is WCDMA or LTE. Why would you dispute this?

 

Robert

[Fraydog]

Don't preach to me about documentation. Yeah, I got a link. It's called the Tmo coverage map. To my eye, it looks like geographically over their coverage area, only about 1/3 of it is WCDMA or LTE. Why would you dispute this?

 

Robert

Mainly due to the fact that the tower grid in those large EDGE/GPRS tower area is simply not dense. I would guess closer to half of T-Mobile towers are fiber served, simply because of the density of the T-Mobile grid in urban areas.

 

I agree with you about the end effect. T-Mobile under serves their rural population, I get that. Still, the 30% of towers seems a very low, very conservative guess. 30% of area having connections to towers with fiber backhaul? I would agree with that figure.

 

I apologize if what I said wasn't well communicated on my part. I don't think I said what I meant clearly.

[WiWavelength]

Uh, Ryan, Robert said 30 percent of T-Mobile's geographic footprint, not total sites. Go back and read his post.

 

AJ

[S4GRU]

Mainly due to the fact that the tower grid in those large EDGE/GPRS tower area is simply not dense. I would guess closer to half of T-Mobile towers are fiber served, simply because of the density of the T-Mobile grid in urban areas. I agree with you about the end effect. T-Mobile under serves their rural population, I get that. Still, the 30% of towers seems a very low, very conservative guess. 30% of area having connections to towers with fiber backhaul? I would agree with that figure.I apologize if what I said wasn't well communicated on my part. I don't think I said what I meant clearly.

I never said anything about towers, tower counts, tower density. I'm talking about geographic coverage. Square mileage. It's about 1/3.

 

You sit there and talk all the time about how the other 2/3 gets slighted by every carrier, even the duopoly. And now you want to give Tmo a pass because they have islands of goodness. Whoop dee doo.

 

It's just the way it is. Tmo only works on 1/3 of their coverage area. And it is certainly fair for me to mention that.

 

Robert via Samsung Galaxy Note II using Tapatalk

 

 

[Fraydog]

I never said anything about towers, tower counts, tower density. I'm talking about geographic coverage. Square mileage. It's about 1/3.

 

You sit there and talk all the time about how the other 2/3 gets slighted by every carrier, even the duopoly. And now you want to give Tmo a pass because they have islands of goodness. Whoop dee doo.

 

It's just the way it is. Tmo only works on 1/3 of their coverage area. And it is certainly fair for me to mention that.

 

Robert via Samsung Galaxy Note II using Tapatalk

Again, I apologize for that. I thought you were talking about direct connections to towers with fiber optic lines. That was a bad reading of what I said on my part.

 

I am sorry about that and I take full responsibility for misconstruing what you said. Furthermore I should have contacted you directly to clear up any misunderstandings.

 

- Ryan

[S4GRU]

Again, I apologize for that. I thought you were talking about direct connections to towers with fiber optic lines. That was a bad reading of what I said on my part. I am sorry about that and I take full responsibility for misconstruing what you said. Furthermore I should have contacted you directly to clear up any misunderstandings. - Ryan

It's not a big deal. I just was surprised because in my mind what I was thinking was obvious and above reproach. So I was caught off guard that it was being questioned. Especially by a staff member. Maybe I'm just overly concerned about the Chiefs.

 

Robert via Samsung Galaxy Note II using Tapatalk

 

[Nickel]

It's not a big deal. I just was surprised because in my mind what I was thinking was obvious and above reproach. So I was caught off guard that it was being questioned. Especially by a staff member. Maybe I'm just overly concerned about the Chiefs. Robert via Samsung Galaxy Note II using Tapatalk

Ryan was still probably processing what happened in the World Series game last night, so it's pretty understandable.

[MrZorbatron]

A series of worlds? You mean they have found us?! Must be all those new cell sites!

[WiWavelength]

A series of worlds? They have found us? Must be all those new cell sites!

Indeed, the time division signal bursts from all of those rural GSM only sites attract alien attention.

 

 

AJ

[Fraydog]

Ryan was still probably processing what happened in the World Series game last night, so it's pretty understandable.

 

I plead no contest to that.

 

To be fair the Cardinals sort of went into a power save state this series. No plate discipline whatsoever. If Boston wins it's because they are the better team. 

[bigsnake49]

Has anybody taken the time to analyze all the bands present in a top of the line T-Mobile phone? Say in a GS4 or an iPhone 5S. How compatible will the phones be to the Sprint Network post 2014?

[MrZorbatron]

I believe the 5S is identical across all carriers, just as the 4S was.  Nobody supports GSM or UMTS on 800 on any model (even Sprint), and only Sprint supports CDMA there.  To my knowledge, the only CDMA capable Tmobile units are the iphone models.

 

Nobody else supports TD-LTE either, on any band.

[Ascertion]

Indeed, the time division signal bursts from all of those rural GSM only sites attract alien attention.

 

 

AJ

It is because they're familiar with our Advanced CDMA technology, but interested in history by researching GSM. Right?

[WiWavelength]

It is because they're familiar with our Advanced CDMA technology, but interested in history by researching GSM. Right?

 

No, it is because GSM sounds like this...

 

 

AJ

[Deval]

Backhaul is a yes in larger cities. Site spacing is not better than Sprint in my experience besides in New York City. Outside of the city is a different story.

 

T-Mobile's site spacing in Jersey blows away Sprint to be honest, especially once you cross central Jersey.