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

[Tengen31]

That's my take.  Other than uploads, Sprint may not be number one but is quite competitive.  I don't drive the number one car, I don't fly the number one airline, I don't drink the number one coffee and so on...I use the best for me.  And Sprint is now becoming more and more useful to more and more people.  Regardless of an absolute number one position.  The difference between 82 of this and 85 of that is pretty immaterial in the user experience.

Robert

People get carried away. Only reason I left was cause of not being able to use volte cause I've had times where I needed it, plus one area in Minnesota (Duluth)where the network is running all 5x5 with very little B41. I'm back now cause S10 has volte

 

Sent from my SM-G975U1 using Tapatalk

 

 

 

[S4GRU]

1 minute ago, Tengen31 said:

People get carried away. Only reason I left was cause of not being able to use it cause I've had times where I needed it, plus one area in Minnesota (Duluth)where the network is running all 5x5 with very little B41. I'm back now cause S10 has volte

Sent from my SM-G975U1 using Tapatalk
 

Yeah, and that's the thing.  People should do what's best for them.  I certainly don't fault you for that! 

Robert

[Tengen31]

Yeah, and that's the thing.  People should do what's best for them.  I certainly don't fault you for that! 
Robert

Yeah in Duluth MN, you really don't want Sprint since they barely have B41 and not at least 10x10 B25, which they can do, it's not a good experience. Even uploading a photo fails, loading webpages it's very slow, I get that area is big att market but, I don't know why Sprint lacks upgrades there.

Sent from my SM-G975U1 using Tapatalk

[Brad The Beast]

35 minutes ago, Tengen31 said:

Yeah in Duluth MN, you really don't want Sprint since they barely have B41 and not at least 10x10 B25, which they can do, it's not a good experience. Even uploading a photo fails, loading webpages it's very slow, I get that area is big att market but, I don't know why Sprint lacks upgrades there.

I don't have any band 41. We have two non-contiguous 5x5 L1900 carriers and a 3x3 L800 carrier. You can get up to 55Mbps down and up to 18Mbps up on band 25 here. Band 26 is completely worthless for downloads though. 

[Grabber5.0]

I don't have any band 41. We have two non-contiguous 5x5 L1900 carriers and a 3x3 L800 carrier. You can get up to 55Mbps down and up to 18Mbps up on band 25 here. Band 26 is completely worthless for downloads though. 

Yuck

[Brad The Beast]

2 minutes ago, Grabber5.0 said:

Yuck

What's yuck about 55 down 18 up?

[Tengen31]

What's yuck about 55 down 18 up?

How are you getting 18 up on a 5x5?

Sent from my SM-G975U1 using Tapatalk

[Brad The Beast]

3 minutes ago, Tengen31 said:

How are you getting 18 up on a 5x5?

5x5 with 64QAM on the uplink has a max of 18.75Mbps. 18Mbps up is the fastest I've seen here. I usually average 13-14Mbps up. 

[Grabber5.0]

What's yuck about 55 down 18 up?

I was referring to the lack of band 41. That setup is not ideal.

[Brad The Beast]

Just now, Grabber5.0 said:

I was referring to the lack of band 41. That setup is not ideal.

Ah. I see. Yes it's definitely not optimal. Luckily there are very few Sprint customers here so band 25 performs fine. It's not amazing or anything but it works. 

[JonnygATL]

9 hours ago, S4GRU said:

That's my take.  Other than uploads, Sprint may not be number one but is quite competitive.  I don't drive the number one car, I don't fly the number one airline, I don't drink the number one coffee and so on...I use the best for me.  And Sprint is now becoming more and more useful to more and more people.  Regardless of an absolute number one position.  The difference between 82 of this and 85 of that is pretty immaterial in the user experience.

Robert

100% agreed. The real takeaway that no one is mentioning is that the big 4 have done an ABSOLUTELY PHENOMENAL JOB of blanketing this massive, massive nation in 4G so ubiquitous that we're absolutely shocked when we're not on it. Job well done, guys. Very well done indeed. 

[BlueAngel]

20 hours ago, Brad The Beast said:

5x5 with 64QAM on the uplink has a max of 18.75Mbps. 18Mbps up is the fastest I've seen here. I usually average 13-14Mbps up. 

18 is the fastest I've seen here as well.

[RedSpark]

Earnings for Fiscal 3Q 2019 are out: https://s21.q4cdn.com/487940486/files/doc_financials/2019/q3/01_Fiscal-3Q19-Earnings-Release-FINAL.pdf

Thoughts?

[S4GRU]

18 minutes ago, RedSpark said:

Earnings for Fiscal 3Q 2019 are out: https://s21.q4cdn.com/487940486/files/doc_financials/2019/q3/01_Fiscal-3Q19-Earnings-Release-FINAL.pdf

Thoughts?

Treading water.  It's a mixed bag.  Not terrible.  Not anything that would doom the company anytime soon.  It makes you wonder how Sprint would be doing if it wasn't in limbo fighting for a merger and spending it's money and energy on competing.  Maybe it would be growing better?  Who knows?

Robert

[RAvirani]

2 hours ago, RedSpark said:

Earnings for Fiscal 3Q 2019 are out: https://s21.q4cdn.com/487940486/files/doc_financials/2019/q3/01_Fiscal-3Q19-Earnings-Release-FINAL.pdf

Thoughts?

My key takeaways:

• Wireless service revenue of $5.2B
• Net loss of $120M, but they cite over $2B of depreciation; depreciation is broken roughly into $1B on network equipment and $1B on leased devices
• $589M expensed in interest this quarter
• Sprint is $37B in debt currently, with ~$30B due by 2025
• ARPA: $124.80, ARPU: $50.37
• 1.98% postpaid churn, up from 1.87% from last quarter; 4.92% prepaid churn, down from 4.94% last quarter
• 10th consecutive quarter of net additions
• 20 million people covered by 5G now with "thousands" of massive-MIMO-equipped sites online
• 37K small cells live, including both mini macros and strand mounts
• Ookla is rating Sprint as the 2nd fast carrier behind AT&T with a 45% increase in downlink speeds YOY
• 5G average downlink speeds are 215 Mbps

[RedSpark]

1 hour ago, S4GRU said:

Treading water.  It's a mixed bag.  Not terrible.  Not anything that would doom the company anytime soon.  It makes you wonder how Sprint would be doing if it wasn't in limbo fighting for a merger and spending it's money and energy on competing.  Maybe it would be growing better?  Who knows?

Robert

To quote one of my favorite series as you said: “Not great... Not terrible.”

Is Sprint fully committed to a network plan now? Are they cheaping out on backhaul to sites? Like you said, it’s hard to gauge what they are doing vs what they can afford.

Sprint’s debt load and upcoming maturities is still very disconcerting. Short of a SoftBank rescue or merger, I’m not sure how they pay that off and get ahead of things. Sprint’s Total liquidity was $5.2 billion at the end of the quarter. That includes $3.2 billion of cash and cash equivalents. If the merger isn’t approved, Sprint will still need to be on the hook for sequential quarters of high capex for the foreseeable future. Simply putting 2.5 GHz on every macro site isn’t enough. There simply aren’t enough macro sites, although mini-macro/strand mounts are helping somewhat.

[RedSpark]

18 minutes ago, RAvirani said:

My key takeaways:

• Wireless service revenue of $5.2B
• Net loss of $120M, but they cite over $2B of depreciation; depreciation is broken roughly into $1B on network equipment and $1B on leased devices
• $589M expensed in interest this quarter
• Sprint is $37B in debt currently, with ~$30B due by 2025
• ARPA: $124.80, ARPU: $50.37
• 10th consecutive quarter of net additions
• 20 million people covered by 5G now with "thousands" of massive-MIMO-equipped sites online
• 37K small cells live, including both mini macros and strand mounts
• Ookla is rating Sprint as the 2nd fast carrier behind AT&T with a 45% increase in downlink speeds YOY
• 5G average downlink speeds are 215 Mbps

Good progress.

However, Churn is bleeding the company out.

[bigsnake49]

Totally treading water. I am more interested on network improvements.

13 minutes ago, RedSpark said:

To quote one of my favorite series as you said: “Not great... Not terrible.”

Is Sprint fully committed to a network plan now? Are they cheaping out on backhaul to sites? Like you said, it’s hard to gauge what they are doing vs what they can afford.

Sprint’s debt load and upcoming maturities is still very disconcerting. Short of a SoftBank rescue or merger, I’m not sure how they pay that off and get ahead of things. Sprint’s Total liquidity was $5.2 billion at the end of the quarter. That includes $3.2 billion of cash and cash equivalents. If the merger isn’t approved, Sprint will still need to be on the hook for sequential quarters of high capex for the foreseeable future. Simply putting 2.5 GHz on every macro site isn’t enough. There simply aren’t enough macro sites, although mini-macro/strand mounts are helping somewhat.

They did invest in their network last year and that's why their cash went down by about $4B.What concerns me is the negative free cash flow. Are they not able to finance activities with debt? Cash will dry up soon. When that happens they either have to pair back investing in their network or declare a Chapter 11.

Edited January 27, 2020 by bigsnake49

[RAvirani]

32 minutes ago, RedSpark said:

However, Churn is bleeding the company out.

Totally forgot to include that. Added. 

[Grabber5.0]

What did they expect to happen to churn when they pumped up subscriber numbers by offering a year of free service and other short-term promos?

[jamesinclair]

21 minutes ago, Grabber5.0 said:

What did they expect to happen to churn when they pumped up subscriber numbers by offering a year of free service and other short-term promos?

 

My gf did the free year and then became a paying customer

[Grabber5.0]

  My gf did the free year and then became a paying customer

 

I'm glad to hear that, but I suspect far less than half stuck around like she did. [emoji106] But who knows, maybe I'm wrong. The intent was probably to give an incentive for people to try the network, and if it works for them, hopefully they'd stick around. I just don't think sign up discounts work very well. 

 

[Brad The Beast]

4 hours ago, RAvirani said:

My key takeaways:

• Wireless service revenue of $5.2B
• Net loss of $120M, but they cite over $2B of depreciation; depreciation is broken roughly into $1B on network equipment and $1B on leased devices
• $589M expensed in interest this quarter
• Sprint is $37B in debt currently, with ~$30B due by 2025
• ARPA: $124.80, ARPU: $50.37
• 1.98% postpaid churn, up from 1.87% from last quarter; 4.92% prepaid churn, down from 4.94% last quarter
• 10th consecutive quarter of net additions
• 20 million people covered by 5G now with "thousands" of massive-MIMO-equipped sites online
• 37K small cells live, including both mini macros and strand mounts
• Ookla is rating Sprint as the 2nd fast carrier behind AT&T with a 45% increase in downlink speeds YOY
• 5G average downlink speeds are 215 Mbps

Missed 200,000 postpaid adds. Went from 53.9 million lines to 54.1 million total lines.

[RAvirani]

4 hours ago, Brad The Beast said:

Missed 200,000 postpaid adds. Went from 53.9 million lines to 54.1 million total lines.

The net postpaid adds actually amounted to 494K, although that was due to the addition of 609K new data lines. Sprint lost 115K voice lines this quarter. Not much exciting stuff there. 

[dkyeager]

The negative press on Sprint in the merger process should be a significant factor in churn. Converting former Clear sites to triband should have had a significant performance impact yet has not dramatically appeared in Rootmetrics results.  The rarity of B25 + B41 + B41 CA is a factor since that would solve band 41 upload congestion (5g would be even better).  In my market attention is shifting to software updates.  VoLTE came to Magic Boxes last week. Overall network improvements might just be a multistep process yet to be completed. The competition does not stand still for Sprint.