Marcelo Claure, Town Hall Meetings, New Family Share Pack Plan, Unlimited Individual Plan, Discussion Thread

[Deval]

If I had to choose between more 8T8R to replace Clear B41 gear or 8T8R on towers that are not currently upgraded/WiMax only, I would take the latter, no question.  Here in the DC market, there are way too many sites, some in busy areas, that are B25/B26 only.  Or areas which are outright holes that replacing existing WiMax-only equipment would fix. 

 

I don't doubt the 8T8R would help matters in tough spots where Clear gear is today, but it seems like a much more marginal benefit to me than filling coverage gaps or upgrading towers with no B41 gear on them.

 

- Trip

 

Are most of them co-located?

[Deval]

That is my main gripe against sprint. Why are there still sites that havent been touched or are 3g only NV in the middle of major cities and suburbs? There is no excuse for it at this point that should mean a Damn to a paying customer.

 

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Maybe they can't be upgraded at all and need to be moved. Maybe they can't get access to the building anymore.

 

There was a site here in NYC that was located on the roof of a hospital that went bankrupt. Due to bankruptcy court and change in ownership, Sprint was basically stuck not able to get access to the roof to work on the equipment. The site would go down for weeks on end and nothing could be done.

 

https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20140122/forest-hills/former-parkway-hospital-becomes-eyesore-amid-uncertain-future (hospital article) 

 

You can see the legacy Sprint 3G equipment on the roof: https://static.panoramio.com.storage.googleapis.com/photos/original/58945890.jpg

They finally got approval to move the site to a neighboring building and built out a new site completely NV ready.

[Trip]

Are most of them co-located?

 

Most of what?  Many of the Clear sites here are co-located with Sprint, though certainly not all.  There are some WiMax-only Clear sites on the same structure as B25/B26 only Sprint and some that are not co-located at all.  And some Sprint-only sites without B41.

 

- Trip

[RedSpark]

So much for those Sprint chainsaw ads: Sheathe your sword, NAD tells Sprint to halt its 50% off ads

[Deval]

Most of what?  Many of the Clear sites here are co-located with Sprint, though certainly not all.  There are some WiMax-only Clear sites on the same structure as B25/B26 only Sprint and some that are not co-located at all.  And some Sprint-only sites without B41.

 

- Trip

 

That's what I mean by co-located. So you have ALU NV sites with legacy Clearwire WiMAX still there?

[Trip]

Maybe they can't be upgraded at all and need to be moved. Maybe they can't get access to the building anymore.

 

There are actually a few that seem to be that way here.  There are two on power lines that don't seem to have been touched and are 3G only.  One would actually probably be my home site if it were running LTE--it seems to be for T-Mobile, at least.  But T-Mobile is running both AWS and 700 LTE from it--I actually drove by the day they were putting up the 700 panels--and all three of the other carriers have multiple LTE bands on their power line poles in the same area, but not Sprint. 

 

Another is on the roof of a hotel where AT&T and T-Mobile both have LTE service.  Sprint, apparently, plans to move to a hotel next door, but I've seen nothing to indicate it's happening any time soon.

 

- Trip

[Trip]

That's what I mean by co-located. So you have ALU NV sites with legacy Clearwire WiMAX still there?

 

Seems that way.  A bunch of them were dual mode, it seems, and quite a few (not all) are running second carrier. 

 

My home site is B25/B26 plus Clear B41 with second carrier.  The next site over has B25/B26 and Clear B41 without second carrier.  A site down the road toward Wegmans has Clear equipment on it without Sprint, presumably turned off now that WiMax is gone, but T-Mobile has AWS and 700 on that one.  And the site at Wegmans is B25/B26 with Clear not running B41.  No 8T8R either.

 

- Trip

[utiz4321]

Maybe they can't be upgraded at all and need to be moved. Maybe they can't get access to the building anymore.

 

There was a site here in NYC that was located on the roof of a hospital that went bankrupt. Due to bankruptcy court and change in ownership, Sprint was basically stuck not able to get access to the roof to work on the equipment. The site would go down for weeks on end and nothing could be done.

 

https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20140122/forest-hills/former-parkway-hospital-becomes-eyesore-amid-uncertain-future (hospital article)

 

You can see the legacy Sprint 3G equipment on the roof: https://static.panoramio.com.storage.googleapis.com/photos/original/58945890.jpg

They finally got approval to move the site to a neighboring building and built out a new site completely NV ready.

Other carriers have to deal with the same problems and manage to overcome them. It is just amazing that sprint hasn't. In the end all of those problems are meaningless for the end user that is stuck having one of those sites in their top five usage.

 

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[RedSpark]

Yes but in urban markets that signal propagation and performance could be rendered moot by the density in place. 

 

I'm sure eventually it would get upgraded but there is zero reason to invest millions upon millions today to rip out perfectly good Samsung 2xCA equipment. 

 

That makes sense. If it resulted in cost savings as a result of ending unnecessary leases was one thing I was considering, but what you're saying makes sense.

[RedSpark]

Other carriers have to deal with the same problems and manage to overcome them. It is just amazing that sprint hasn't. In the end all of those problems are meaningless for the end user that is stuck having one of those sites in their top five usage.

 

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Other companies already had backhaul in place as directed by forward thinking management.

Other companies had better permitting departments having more capable executives/management.

Other companies had (and have) adequate funding to do what needs doing.

 

Sprint Zone is our recourse for reporting issues, but I hope Sprint still keeps that Top Ten **** List for its worst performing sites: http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-how-to-fix-sprint/

 

Shortly after arriving, Claure began daily meetings about Sprint’s worst-performing cell sites—what the network team called the Top 10 S--- List. With about 20 executives around a table or dialing in, Claure brought up each site responsible for large numbers of dropped calls and asked how it would be fixed within 24 hours.

 

If a site was still on the list the next day, Claure would ask again: Should an antenna be tilted up or down or sideways, so it points toward more customers? Does Sprint need to add antennas, or use antennas with more bandwidth? “It was painful,” says John Saw, Sprint’s chief technology officer. “But it was good for getting the network fixed.”

 

[RedSpark]

Some more info on Sprint's 5G Test from WirelessWeek:

 

Sprint and Nokia on Friday conducted a 5G demonstration at Levis Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif. during a Centennial Copa America soccer event, delivering live 4k video streaming and virtual reality experiences at speeds of up to 2.3 gbps.

 

According to Nokia, the tests were performed using a live millimeter wave system running at 73 GHz. Sprint said the demonstration utilized beam switching, which is a method that allows a system to track a device and select the best antenna to send signals to its targeted location. Sprint said the test also included support for “dynamic TDD – the ability to adjust in real-time the allocated capacity for downlink and uplink traffic based on network demand.”

 

In addition to providing speeds of up to 2.3 gbps, Nokia said the 5G system also supported spectral bandwidth of 1 GHz and one way air interface latency of about one millisecond.

 

 

 

 

The carrier is also planning 5G tests in collaboration with Ericsson at Lincoln Financial Stadium in Philadelphia, Pa., on June 9, 11 and 14.

 

Sprint’s tests with Ericsson will utilize just one experimental 5G base station and one piece of experimental 5G mobile device running on spectrum in the 14.5 GHz to 15.35 GHz range. The base station and mobile unit will be kept within 50 feet of each other during the testing, Ericsson said.

 

 

Great stuff Sprint! Sprint essentially leapfrogged everyone on 5G.

 

It would amazing if SoftBank was secretly bidding on the 600 MHz Spectrum in the Auction...

[RedSpark]

Verizon's "can you hear me now" spokesman gets a Sprint phone via Direct 2 You:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owrVl6qYIEg

 

And poof it's now gone... oh well.

[Fraydog]

The 4K Video demo seems more like a home broadband play, right?

 

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[RedSpark]

The 4K Video demo seems more like a home broadband play, right?

 

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Sounds like it. Also, "Internet of Things" stuff: http://www.bizjournals.com/kansascity/news/2016/06/03/sprint-5g-testing-at-copa-america-tournament.html

 

Jason Elliott, 5G market development manager for Nokia, said virtual reality, on top of the Internet of Things, will be a big part of 5G capabilities.

"It's about how you deliver experiences to people who can't physically be there," Elliott said in an interview.

 

However, it doesn't square with what Sprint has said:

 

http://www.rcrwireless.com/20160526/carriers/sprint-small-cell-plans-rely-delicate-financial-balance-tag2

 

On the other end of the financial scale, Robbiati said the carrier is not focused on growing “very low” average revenue per user segments like machine-to-machine or, as it’s more commonly referred to today, the “Internet of Things” market.

[caspar347]

We have a couple hundred Clear sites in Charlotte. A bit more than a hundred of those are collocated or redundant with Sprint sites. The remaining (a bit under a hundred) are non-redundant and would fill 3G gaps. Out of those (a bit under a hundred) non-redundant sites, only a couple dozen are dual-mode. The rest are WiMax only and are now sitting dormant. I haven't seen a conversion yet. And we need them dearly.

[ingenium]

Pittsburgh has a ton of Wimax only sites that aren't colocated. Clearwire used Motorola equipment in Pittsburgh, which can't run B41. So the only B41 is 8T8R. There are many Clearwire sites in the perfect position to fill in Sprint coverage gaps, but they haven't been replaced yet.

 

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[notsrealinc]

Looks like Marcelo responded to the issue with the NAD in a tweet:

 

@marceloclaure/status/738874103617179648

 

 

[IamMrFamous07]

I really hope the 10 billion dollars is for NGN densification than the 600 MHz auction.

[ericdabbs]

I really hope the 10 billion dollars is for NGN densification than the 600 MHz auction.

Agree.. use the funds to serve both purposes.

 

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[Fraydog]

Am I the only one here who thinks CYBIH has run its course? Sprint has to be able to sell on merit and network performance.

 

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[Dkoellerwx]

 

 

3xCA is going to happen early next year

Where did you get this? Last I had seen estimates were for late summer... this year.

 

 

 

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[richy]

Am I the only one here who thinks CYBIH has run its course? Sprint has to be able to sell on merit and network performance.

 

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Yes and no I totally agree that sprint should be selling on the strength of its network, but if they have significant capacity spare there's something to be said for undercutting the competition to get some momentum. It's basically what TMO did, the whole hay cheap unlimited plus shiny crap. They had a spectrum per sub advantage and they used it to give people 10 to 20gb a month for less money than 2gb from the big two. If you can sell cheap and sell on merit and gradually increase your cost over time that's a decent stance to take.

[RedSpark]

Where did you get this? Last I had seen estimates were for late summer... this year.

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From Page 5 of the recent Earnings Call Transcript: http://s21.q4cdn.com/487940486/files/doc_financials/quarterly/2015/Q4/S-US-20160503-1832656-C.pdf

 

 

"Sprint is delivering the fastest download speeds in many markets across the nation, including Chicago, Houston, Las Vegas among others. In addition, we are already rolling out devices in the market that support three -channel carrier aggregation, including the new Samsung Galaxy S7, and Sprint has demonstrated speeds of over 300 megabits per second in recent lab testing on the device. While we're already [ph] sitting (11:35) the base with capable devices, we expect to roll out three-carrier aggregation in the network in early 2017."

[laqn1283]

To those who understand about finance and accounting, what do you think about this strategy:  softbank repurchases all of sprint's debts, right now they are trading about 80 to 85 cents on a dollar.  So if softbank offers to buy them at 90 cents on a dollar many bondholders will jump on that deal since they can easily make 5 to 10% on their investment.  The advantage for Sprint is 2 fold: they trim their net debt on books by about 2 billions and reduce interest expense by 200 to 300 millions yearly ( softbank can lend them at 6% rather than 7 to 11% they are paying right now).  

[DanielB]

To those who understand about finance and accounting, what do you think about this strategy:  softbank repurchases all of sprint's debts, right now they are trading about 80 to 85 cents on a dollar.  So if softbank offers to buy them at 90 cents on a dollar many bondholders will jump on that deal since they can easily make 5 to 10% on their investment.  The advantage for Sprint is 2 fold: they trim their net debt on books by about 2 billions and reduce interest expense by 200 to 300 millions yearly ( softbank can lend them at 6% rather than 7 to 11% they are paying right now).

 

 

Few reasons it won't work. Most importantly, it would jeopardize SoftBank's credit rating, which would put them in default on some of their own bonds.