Official Tmobile-Sprint merger discussion thread

[IamMrFamous07]

4 minutes ago, derrph said:

I skimmed the report and alot of good things were said said that made me excited for the merger. I don't want Sprint to go but it was really a eye opener as to the state of Sprint and their network going forward.  I would like to keep my plan but worse case if I can't i'll just jump onto my T-mobile One All In promo plan that I currently pay for my parents which would be an extra $35 per month.

That’s why I didn’t get to excited with Sprints network announcements. I had a feeling something was trouble. I’m sad to see them go but Band 41 will live on forever!!! 

[IamMrFamous07]

7 minutes ago, bigsnake49 said:

Now they are trying to sell this merger so they are painting the financial situation as bleak as possible but I have long said that Sprint is not sustainable on its own without some major investment by their parent who was unwilling to invest in it. I almost wish that Dish had acquired them.

Looking back I wish Dish acquired Sprint too. I think the two would have been great since they could offer many services to consumers and not to mention Dish had a good amount of Spectrum at that time.

What Sprint and T-Mobile are trying to accomplish right now is what Dish and Sprint could have done years ago.

 

 

[derrph]

7 minutes ago, IamMrFamous07 said:

Really good. Haven’t experienced any lag or hiccup. Also Volte works like a champ. Haven’t dropped a call yet

That’s dope. I’m glad it’s worked out for you and to be able fully utilize your device with the VoLTE and stuff. You’ll be right back on B41 next year like you never left. I’m sure T-Mobile will really put it to use. 

[RedSpark]

Sprint is in big trouble—and knows it

Among Sprint’s challenges:

• Sprint continues to lose customers “despite Sprint’s aggressive attempts to add subscribers and thereby gain...
• Scale,” which is “exacerbating its scale disadvantages compared to larger competitors.”
• Sprint’s LTE network is smaller than those of its rivals, forcing it to engage in “costly” roaming agreements.
• Within Sprint’s network footprint, “the propagation limitations of its 2.5 GHz spectrum, coupled with an inadequate density of cell sites equipped with 2.5 GHz radios, result in significant coverage gaps in the 2.5 GHz layer.”
• Sprint is only going to deploy 5G on its 2.5 GHz spectrum, and only in dense urban areas, because it doesn’t have enough low-band spectrum for 5G and because it will be too expensive to deploy 5G on its 2.5 GHz spectrum nationwide. Moreover, Sprint is going to deploy massive MIMO—the carrier’s stepping stone to 5G—in areas that are currently congested, meaning that its 5G network “will not be contiguous.”
• Sprint continues to suffer from a “negative perception” of its network among Americans—“in fact, Sprint is the only major carrier with a rising churn rate.”
• Sprint’s finances are challenged, to say the least. “Sprint’s service revenue and ARPU have been declining for at least five years, with total service revenue falling around 25 percent from 2013 to 2018, and postpaid ARPU falling approximately 30 percent. Sprint also has a current net debt of approximately $32 billion and is the most highly leveraged company in the S&P 500,” the carrier wrote.

Reading this list was really depressing...

[IamMrFamous07]

3 minutes ago, derrph said:

That’s dope. I’m glad it’s worked out for you and to be able fully utilize your device with the VoLTE and stuff. You’ll be right back on B41 next year like you never left. I’m sure T-Mobile will really put it to use. 

Yup I can’t wait. Luckily Sprint has a good amount b41 deployed in urban areas. So I would assume T-Mobile will have to do a carrier update for their phones that are b41 capable. 

[bigsnake49]

20 minutes ago, IamMrFamous07 said:

Looking back I wish Dish acquired Sprint too. I think the two would have been great since they could offer many services to consumers and not to mention Dish had a good amount of Spectrum at that time.

What Sprint and T-Mobile are trying to accomplish right now is what Dish and Sprint could have done years ago.

 

 

Yeah, Dish could have invested all that money that they invested in spectrum on Sprint's network instead. They could have brought the AWS-4 25x20 band of spectrum to sprint to strengthen Sprint's midband position, they would not have needed to bid on the AWS-3 auction and they could have probably acquired a 10x10 band of 600MHz.

[IamMrFamous07]

2 minutes ago, bigsnake49 said:

Yeah, Dish could have invested all that money that they invested in spectrum on Sprint's network instead. They could have brought the AWS-4 25x20 band of spectrum to sprint to strengthen Sprint's midband position, they would not have needed to bid on the AWS-3 auction and they could have probably acquired a 10x10 band of 600MHz.

Yup and we could have Sling for free lol

[bigsnake49]

2 minutes ago, IamMrFamous07 said:

Yup and we could have Sling for free lol

Not a bad thing ?!

 

Edited June 20, 2018 by bigsnake49

[Paynefanbro]

24 minutes ago, RedSpark said:

Sprint is in big trouble—and knows it

Reading this list was really depressing...

I read the portion of the filing that is being referenced in the article and it makes it seem as though both Sprint and T-Mobile are in a dire position. It's funny that despite all that has been stated, both carriers have 5G plans going out at least 6 years from now prepared already, should they be forced to operate separately. 

The main issue presented is that Sprint can't deploy 2.5GHz 5G in rural areas because they don't have the money to do so. The only way to get more money is to have more customers. Because of Sprint's poor network perception, the only way for Sprint to get new customers is to lower prices. And because of low prices, Sprint can't make as much money off of their customers so they're stuck in a loop. 

T-Mobile on the other hand has the money to build a broad 5G network over 600MHz, but they don't have the spectrum to provide 5G speeds like Sprint can. So they'll be able to claim the title of the largest 5G network by square mileage but with speeds that aren't much better than current LTE speeds. Sprint will a larger network capable of providing faster speeds. Basically, T-Mobile won't be able to compete effectively in the 5G space in terms of offering "true 5G experience" to their customers until they can get everyone off of LTE which isn't happening soon.

The solution is that in merging, the New T-Mobile will be able to deploy 2.5GHz over a large area so that more people can have access to those higher speeds that they wouldn't get by 600MHz only or because of Sprint's smaller network.

[IamMrFamous07]

10 minutes ago, Paynefanbro said:

I read the portion of the filing that is being referenced in the article and it makes it seem as though both Sprint and T-Mobile are in a dire position. It's funny that despite all that has been stated, both carriers have 5G plans going out at least 6 years from now prepared already, should they be forced to operate separately. 

The main issue presented is that Sprint can't deploy 2.5GHz 5G in rural areas because they don't have the money to do so. The only way to get more money is to have more customers. Because of Sprint's poor network perception, the only way for Sprint to get new customers is to lower prices. And because of low prices, Sprint can't make as much money off of their customers so they're stuck in a loop. 

T-Mobile on the other hand has the money to build a broad 5G network over 600MHz, but they don't have the spectrum to provide 5G speeds like Sprint can. So they'll be able to claim the title of the largest 5G network by square mileage but with speeds that aren't much better than current LTE speeds. Sprint will a larger network capable of providing faster speeds. Basically, T-Mobile won't be able to compete effectively in the 5G space in terms of offering "true 5G experience" to their customers until they can get everyone off of LTE which isn't happening soon.

The solution is that in merging, the New T-Mobile will be able to deploy 2.5GHz over a large area so that more people can have access to those higher speeds that they wouldn't get by 600MHz only or because of Sprint's smaller network.

In the event the merger doesn’t go through, do you think Sprint will sell some of its band 41 spectrum to T-Mobile? since Sprint needs the $ and T-Mobile needs the high-band spectrum

[tybo31316]

In the event the merger doesn’t go through, do you think Sprint will sell some of its band 41 spectrum to T-Mobile? since Sprint needs the $ and T-Mobile needs the high-band spectrum

I hope not. At this point if the merger doesn’t go through. I hope SoftBank sell Sprint to DISH.

[Paynefanbro]

Just now, IamMrFamous07 said:

In the event the merger doesn’t go through, do you think Sprint will sell some of its band 41 spectrum to T-Mobile? since Sprint needs the $ and T-Mobile needs the high-band spectrum

Nope. Sprint's plan is eventually to use all of the spectrum for 5G. Selling any of it gets rid of Sprint's advantage. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that Sprint selling Band 41 to T-Mobile would kill the company. Sprint's Band 41 gives them the ability to deploy high speed 5G in a traditional network setup with macros, etc. mmWave will pretty much only be used on small cells and 600MHz only gives people slight boost in speeds despite the vast coverage you'll get. If anyone else had the spectrum that Sprint has, they'd crush them.

[red_dog007]

Trying to fuel the merger approval with these "excuses".  

[tommym65]

16 minutes ago, tybo31316 said:

I hope not. At this point if the merger doesn’t go through. I hope SoftBank sell Sprint to DISH.

Dish = Charlie Ergen.  Nope.  I would change carriers instantly.

[bigsnake49]

18 minutes ago, tommym65 said:

Dish = Charlie Ergen.  Nope.  I would change carriers instantly.

Plus Dish is up to their necks in debt right now.

[Mr.Nuke]

1 hour ago, RedSpark said:

Sprint is in big trouble—and knows it

Reading this list was really depressing...

Quite the premise for an article based on a document that is doing everything it can to sell the FCC idea on the notion that the two companies need to merge to survive...

 

1 hour ago, Paynefanbro said:

I read the portion of the filing that is being referenced in the article and it makes it seem as though both Sprint and T-Mobile are in a dire position.

Yeah if you want to view an earnings release or earnings call as Sprint putting on a positivity show, you wouldn't necessarily be wrong. But if that is your position, then you also need to realize the FCC document is just as far if not further in the opposite direction to do everything they can to get the merger through. The truth is somewhere in the middle between the two.

[Paynefanbro]

2 minutes ago, Mr.Nuke said:

Quite the premise for an article based on a document that is doing everything it can to sell the FCC idea on the notion that the two companies need to merge to survive...

 

Yeah if you want to view an earnings release or earnings call as Sprint putting on a positivity show, you wouldn't necessarily be wrong. But if that is your position, then you also need to realize the FCC document is just as far if not further in the opposite direction to do everything they can to get the merger through. The truth is somewhere in the middle between the two.

I agree completely and even posted that in a comment on reddit before I saw you said the same thing 2 minutes before me so I deleted my comment and upvoted yours lol.

[greenbastard]

6 hours ago, bigsnake49 said:

I like the fact that the average signal of the new entity will be 12db better than Sprint standalone. So as a Sprint customer I have a lot to gain. But it will only increase T-Mobile's average signal by one db, which means that they don't plan to increase coverage that much from what T-Mobile covers right now. So the 20,000 additional macro sites will mostly be capacity sites. 

I wonder if  T-Mobile's 700MHz and Sprint's 800MHz will carry VoLTE traffic preferentially. 

I haven't read the report, but it makes sense in my market. T-Mobile has the best site density of all the 4 major carriers in most markets in Texas.

Edited June 20, 2018 by greenbastard

[greenbastard]

4 hours ago, IamMrFamous07 said:

I made the switch to T-Mobile and I’m very impressed with their service. I can only imagine what the combine network will feel like.

 

As did I. Midband 20x20 FDD LTE + 15x15 FDD LTE will do that. They also have a very dense network and are pushing ahead with small cells (without being sneaky like Mobilitie as well).

Add n41 to all of their towers, and Verizon & At&t won't be able to match the speeds and capacity the New T-Mobile will provide. This truly is setting up the be one scary urban network.

[bigsnake49]

1 hour ago, greenbastard said:

As did I. Midband 20x20 FDD LTE + 15x15 FDD LTE will do that. They also have a very dense network and are pushing ahead with small cells (without being sneaky like Mobilitie as well).

Add n41 to all of their towers, and Verizon & At&t won't be able to match the speeds and capacity the New T-Mobile will provide. This truly is setting up the be one scary urban network.

Add another 15x15 or even 20x20 in some markets for Sprint's band 25 and you have a very nice midband network.

[Johnner1999]

Though many of the bullets match up with what many have stated here before. Myself included....




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[bigsnake49]

Look, they are not saying something different than what we have been saying in these forums. When they do the quarterly reports they tend to emphasize the positive and minimize the negative. In this case they are doing the opposite.

[RedSpark]

1 hour ago, bigsnake49 said:

Look, they are not saying something different than what we have been saying in these forums. When they do the quarterly reports they tend to emphasize the positive and minimize the negative. In this case they are doing the opposite.

It was honestly shocking to see Sprint officially put in writing what my suspicions have been in terms of their network plans and business sustainability going forward.

Marcelo put a pretty face on it for a long time in terms of a “five year turnaround” plan, but it’s now clear that the marketing and messaging around that was to buy time/room to get to this point in time for a merger to happen.

The stuff/figures in the redacted portions of the FCC Filing must also present a pretty bleak picture on Sprint, if the unredacted text reads as is.

[nexgencpu]

27 minutes ago, RedSpark said:

It was honestly shocking to see Sprint officially put in writing what my suspicions have been in terms of their network plans and business sustainability going forward.

Marcelo put a pretty face on it for a long time in terms of a “five year turnaround” plan, but it’s now clear that the marketing and messaging around that was to buy time/room to get to this point in time for a merger to happen.

The stuff/figures in the redacted portions of the FCC Filing must also present a pretty bleak picture on Sprint, if the unredacted text reads as is.

Those FCC docs are all in place to "sell" the idea of the merger. So you better believe they are over blowing all of Sprint's inadequacies (and T-mobile's for that matter)

There's no question that they can both go at it alone (T-mobile especially) it would just not be nearly as fruitful from a business stand point. 

[utiz4321]

3 hours ago, nexgencpu said:

Those FCC docs are all in place to "sell" the idea of the merger. So you better believe they are over blowing all of Sprint's inadequacies (and T-mobile's for that matter)

There's no question that they can both go at it alone (T-mobile especially) it would just not be nearly as fruitful from a business stand point. 

And the quarterly earnings are there to sell sprint stock. The cant lie on either, so the smart move is to listen to both to fill in the story. They dont contradict each other, rather the tell different parts of the same story. Put them together and any reasonable person would side with the merger.