Official Tmobile-Sprint merger discussion thread

[bigsnake49]

1 hour ago, anthony.spina97 said:

Basically. The CDMA model uses a Qualcomm modem whereas the GSM model uses an Intel modem, therefore no CDMA support.

 

-Anthony

This year I think Intel's modem gets CDMA. There's also a rumor that Apple will have their own modem sometime soon.

[NYC126]

This merger is pretty much approved in my opinion. ATT and Verizon are making moves on their data plans which indicate this.  Verizon got three plans:

Go unlimited  80/mo with only 480P video

Beyond  unlimited 90/mo (720P video)

Above unlimited 100 dollars/mo

And if you want 1080P video you need to chime in 10 dollars extra

Meanwhile, ATT is forcing unlimited users to buy skinny TV bundled plans.

Once the merger is approved I think Verizon will raise the price of their Beyond and Above unlimited plans...... because of 5G.

 

[utiz4321]

5 hours ago, RedSpark said:

So the CFO lied?: https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-cfo-robbiati-600-mhz-spectrum-past

“We did not participate in the 600 MHz (auction) not because we didn’t have money at the time, or we were under-resourced for it,” he said. “It is simply spectrum that is spectrum of the past. The world is moving toward high-capacity wireless data networks, and in that world the best and most efficient spectrum that is needed for that… is mid-band spectrum, the spectrum that we have, the 2.5 GHz spectrum.”

Robbiati also noted that the TV broadcasters’ airwaves currently up for grabs may not be available for several years. The FCC has issued a 39-month repacking plan for that spectrum, enabling the broadcasters to move to other airwaves while their former spectrum is reshuffled for wireless use.

“Why invest in 600 MHz spectrum if that spectrum doesn’t really cater for the future, and also it’s spectrum you cannot deploy for four years?” Robbiati asked rhetorically. “And it doesn’t have an ecosystem in support as widespread as 2.5 spectrum, which is the largest ecosystem in the world.”

He mislead. They technically could have spent the money, but then they would have been screwed for resouces to deploy it and 2.5. They dont lie, they highlight what they want to. It is all sales. 

[Terrell352]

What does nationwide mean to you? I said in my previous comment that nationwide is used in two contexts, in terms of covering most cities and suburbs and also referring to blanket coverage. If Sprint covers most cities and suburbs, effectively covering most of the population, by all accounts of how the word "nationwide" has been used in the past, Sprint would have a nationwide 5G network. Sprint never claimed they'd offer any amount of blanket 5G coverage over 2.5GHz, so where are you getting this expectation from? T-Mobile's 600MHz deployment has happened in rural areas mostly and is still waiting in urban areas across the country. That map that they are showing for 5G coverage in their FCC filing is in 2024, not 2019. So while they are deploying quickly in areas that they can, they are still playing the waiting game like Sprint is in other areas.
Verizon didn't participate and AT&T barely participated in the 600MHz auction. Why? Because it's not worth it to spend billions on a spectrum that has very little net benefit to consumers. That's why they keep calling it spectrum of the past. If Sprint had bid against T-Mobile they'd likely end up with even smaller broken up chunks of 600MHz in fewer places which would have made it even less practical to own any.

Verizon and At&t didnt participate in the 600 auction because they have plenty of low band to go around. Verizon has 1-2 layers of lowband b13 and b5. Att has 2-3 layers b5, b12/17 and b14. Sprint needed that lowband and would have drastically improved coverage and capacity for lowband. 3-5mhz of b26 that it's not even aggregated is not going to cut it. Sprint has lied before. Where is Gigabit LTE that they announced 16 months ago that was supposed to launch in 2017??? Why is Sprint all of a sudden really quiet about 4xCA that was supposed to launch??

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

[dro1984]

9 hours ago, Terrell352 said:

Verizon and At&t didnt participate in the 600 auction because they have plenty of low band to go around. Verizon has 1-2 layers of lowband b13 and b5. Att has 2-3 layers b5, b12/17 and b14. Sprint needed that lowband and would have drastically improved coverage and capacity for lowband. 3-5mhz of b26 that it's not even aggregated is not going to cut it. Sprint has lied before. Where is Gigabit LTE that they announced 16 months ago that was supposed to launch in 2017??? Why is Sprint all of a sudden really quiet about 4xCA that was supposed to launch??

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
 

Don't forget VoLTE.    That was promised and continually delayed also.   

[RedSpark]

9 hours ago, Terrell352 said:

Verizon and At&t didnt participate in the 600 auction because they have plenty of low band to go around. Verizon has 1-2 layers of lowband b13 and b5. Att has 2-3 layers b5, b12/17 and b14. Sprint needed that lowband and would have drastically improved coverage and capacity for lowband. 3-5mhz of b26 that it's not even aggregated is not going to cut it. Sprint has lied before. Where is Gigabit LTE that they announced 16 months ago that was supposed to launch in 2017??? Why is Sprint all of a sudden really quiet about 4xCA that was supposed to launch??

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
 

Great points. Once Sprint said it wouldn’t participate, we were told low band wasn’t necessary for Sprint’s new non-traditional network build.... and as we know, that didn’t pan out.

So now they’re back to doing a traditional build... only there’s no 600 MHz Spectrum for them to do it with. They’re now counting on getting it from T-Mobile in a merger.

Any updates on Massive MIMO deployments? Either not much is actually happening or Sprint is doing a poor job communicating what actually is.

[bigsnake49]

9 hours ago, Terrell352 said:

Verizon and At&t didnt participate in the 600 auction because they have plenty of low band to go around. Verizon has 1-2 layers of lowband b13 and b5. Att has 2-3 layers b5, b12/17 and b14. Sprint needed that lowband and would have drastically improved coverage and capacity for lowband. 3-5mhz of b26 that it's not even aggregated is not going to cut it. Sprint has lied before. Where is Gigabit LTE that they announced 16 months ago that was supposed to launch in 2017??? Why is Sprint all of a sudden really quiet about 4xCA that was supposed to launch??

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
 

Because they are reserving some spectrum for 5G. 3xCA is plenty if deployed everywhere. Let them deploy 4x4 MIMO, 256QAM and then Massive MIMO first augmented by small cells.

[RedSpark]

14 minutes ago, dro1984 said:

Don't forget VoLTE.    That was promised and continually delayed also.   

It’s supposed to happen this fall.

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-expects-to-deploy-volte-fall

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-still-track-volte-despite-roaming-agreement-t-mobile

Truth is, you wouldn’t want to have VoLTE before the Network is ready for it. Better to have more reliable CDMA.

As for why the network wasn’t ready for VoLTE for so long, limited Capex and other related factors probably explain it. Perhaps the 800 MHz rebanding issue as well.

[bigsnake49]

2 minutes ago, RedSpark said:

It’s supposed to happen this fall.

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-expects-to-deploy-volte-fall

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-still-track-volte-despite-roaming-agreement-t-mobile

Truth is, you wouldn’t want to have VoLTE before the Network is ready for it. Better to have more reliable CDMA.

As for why the network wasn’t ready for VoLTE for so long, limited Capex and other related factors probably explain it. Perhaps the 800 MHz rebanding issue as well.

Hell they do not have band 26 deployed on every site. For example the site half a mile from my house. I have great 1x800 coverage (80-90dbm RSSI) from distant sites (4-6) miles. 

[RedSpark]

10 hours ago, utiz4321 said:

He mislead. They technically could have spent the money, but then they would have been screwed for resouces to deploy it and 2.5. They dont lie, they highlight what they want to. It is all sales. 

It’s hard to know what’s the truth here.

I do think that once Sprint passed on the 600 MHz auction, it was commited to a merger. We were told otherwise of course that Sprint had a non-traditional plan for its 2.5 Spectrum and there was plenty of skepticism from the Wireless establishment that we were told to dismiss because they didn’t appreciate Sprint’s secret sauce and the new way of doing things.

The long play was for Sprint to pitch the FCC alongside T-Mobile for a spectrum reserve (shooting for 40 MHz), which it was able to partially achieve (turned out to be 30 MHz). This ensured its potential future merger partner would get it. Of course, I also think it determined Sprint’s fate as a standalone company.

[bigsnake49]

13 minutes ago, RedSpark said:

It’s hard to know what’s the truth here.

I do think that once Sprint passed on the 600 MHz auction, it was commited to a merger. We were told otherwise of course that Sprint had a non-traditional plan for its 2.5 Spectrum and there was plenty of skepticism from the Wireless establishment that we were told to dismiss because they didn’t appreciate Sprint’s secret sauce and the new way of doing things.

The long play was for Sprint to pitch the FCC alongside T-Mobile for a spectrum reserve (shooting for 40 MHz), which it was able to partially achieve (turned out to be 30 MHz). This ensured its potential future merger partner would get it. Of course, I also think it determined Sprint’s fate as a standalone company.

Masayoshi Son wanted to merge with T-Mobile from the get go. He had no desire to invest further in Sprint.

[Terrell352]

31 minutes ago, bigsnake49 said:

Because they are reserving some spectrum for 5G. 3xCA is plenty if deployed everywhere. Let them deploy 4x4 MIMO, 256QAM and then Massive MIMO first augmented by small cells.

Once again 4x4 MIMO, 256qam was supposed to happened last year...so. Massive MIMO from what we seen on the charts that Marcelo presented in court will be extremely limited. They can say we will deploy thousands but how many? 3-5 thousand? Sprint made a statement earlier in the year that they would have nationwide 5G by the beginning of the second half of 2019. That map says that was a flat out lie. Just because Sprint says it doesn’t mean that they will follow through every time. They will say anything to keep shareholders happy as would any company. B41 is not the end all solution because it is not viable indoors even with HPUE. The magic box as great as it is can’t be the solution because latency is too high. Small cells still have many battleground states where people don’t want it to happen. Two low band layers with 10-25mhz of capacity would have been the rural and indoor solution.

[bigsnake49]

7 minutes ago, Terrell352 said:

Once again 4x4 MIMO, 256qam was supposed to happened last year...so. Massive MIMO from what we seen on the charts that Marcelo presented in court will be extremely limited. They can say we will deploy thousands but how many? 3-5 thousand? Sprint made a statement earlier in the year that they would have nationwide 5G by the beginning of the second half of 2019. That map says that was a flat out lie. Just because Sprint says it doesn’t mean that they will follow through every time. They will say anything to keep shareholders happy as would any company. B41 is not the end all solution because it is not viable indoors even with HPUE. The magic box as great as it is can’t be the solution because latency is too high. Small cells still have many battleground states where people don’t want it to happen. Two low band layers with 10-25mhz of capacity would have been the rural and indoor solution.

I agree with you and I had hoped that they would have participated in the 600MHz auction.  I am glad they are merging with T-Mobile.

[RedSpark]

27 minutes ago, bigsnake49 said:

Masayoshi Son wanted to merge with T-Mobile from the get go. He had no desire to invest further in Sprint.

That’s become very clear over time.

Flashback to November 2017:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sprint-corp-network/sprint-to-accelerate-network-investment-ceo-says-idUSKBN1D82P2

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/softbank-s-son-doubling-down-sprint-will-triple-capex-to-6b-medium-term

Sigh...

[jroepcke51]

19 hours ago, RedSpark said:

There’s two Model Numbers: https://www.apple.com/iphone-x/specs/

Cellular and Wireless

• Model A1865*

• FDD-LTE (Bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 12, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 66)
• TD-LTE (Bands 34, 38, 39, 40, 41)
• TD-SCDMA 1900 (F), 2000 (A)
• CDMA EV-DO Rev. A (800, 1900, 2100 MHz)
• UMTS/HSPA+/DC-HSDPA (850, 900, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100 MHz)
• GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)

• Model A1901*

Model A1901 does not support CDMA networks, such as those used by Verizon and Sprint.

• FDD-LTE (Bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 12, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 66)
• TD-LTE (Bands 34, 38, 39, 40, 41)
• UMTS/HSPA+/DC-HSDPA (850, 900, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100 MHz)
• GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)

• All models

• 802.11ac Wi‑Fi with MIMO
• Bluetooth 5.0 wireless technology
• NFC with reader mode

The models are defined specifically by SIM. The SIM activates the different bands or uses (i.e., CDMA for Sprint or VoLTE for Tmo).

[RedSpark]

12 minutes ago, jroepcke51 said:

The models are defined specifically by SIM. The SIM activates the different bands or uses (i.e., CDMA for Sprint or VoLTE for Tmo).

So the iPhone X only uses the Qualcomm Modem?

[jefbal99]

2 hours ago, RedSpark said:

It’s supposed to happen this fall.

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-expects-to-deploy-volte-fall

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-still-track-volte-despite-roaming-agreement-t-mobile

Truth is, you wouldn’t want to have VoLTE before the Network is ready for it. Better to have more reliable CDMA.

As for why the network wasn’t ready for VoLTE for so long, limited Capex and other related factors probably explain it. Perhaps the 800 MHz rebanding issue as well.

Wasn't that the point in NV1.0, the CDMA upgrade was in place long term to allow the data network to be built out, then in 10ish years (we are 6yrs into that), so we have in theory, another 4 years for full VoLTE deployment.

[bigsnake49]

8 minutes ago, jefbal99 said:

Wasn't that the point in NV1.0, the CDMA upgrade was in place long term to allow the data network to be built out, then in 10ish years (we are 6yrs into that), so we have in theory, another 4 years for full VoLTE deployment.

I think that the timetable was accelerated by Verizon's sunsetting of CDMA which Sprint depends on for roaming.

[JustinRP37]

37 minutes ago, jroepcke51 said:

The models are defined specifically by SIM. The SIM activates the different bands or uses (i.e., CDMA for Sprint or VoLTE for Tmo).

This isn't true. The models are defined by the modem inside Qualcomm or Intel. The Qualcomm modem is used only for Verizon and Sprint phones. The Intel modem lacks CDMA completely. The SIM is simply the card that tells the modem what network it is on. You can't pop in a Sprint SIM card into the T-Mobile iPhone X and have it work on CDMA. 

[red_dog007]

12 hours ago, bigsnake49 said:

I agree with you and I had hoped that they would have participated in the 600MHz auction.  I am glad they are merging with T-Mobile.

Instead of being glad with the merger, go to one of the three other carriers that will satisfy your needs.  

Especially with these large acquisitions, the consumers never win unless there are restrictions placed on the merger that directly benefit  or protect the consumers.

In this case, the only people who might benefit are Sprint customers.  But these guys could just switch providers if they really needed to change providers.

[derrph]

3 hours ago, red_dog007 said:

Instead of being glad with the merger, go to one of the three other carriers that will satisfy your needs.  

Especially with these large acquisitions, the consumers never win unless there are restrictions placed on the merger that directly benefit  or protect the consumers.

In this case, the only people who might benefit are Sprint customers.  But these guys could just switch providers if they really needed to change providers.

I agree. Sprint users will gain the most from this merger in the ways of better coverage and more consistent speeds. 

Brand loyalty especially with these carriers is just not worth it most of the time cause they owe us nothing. If you’re not liking the quality of service or whatever, switch and go to a carrier that’s going to work for your needs. There’s no use in just settling just because you’re rooting for the underdog and stuff. 

[utiz4321]

4 hours ago, red_dog007 said:

Instead of being glad with the merger, go to one of the three other carriers that will satisfy your needs.  

Especially with these large acquisitions, the consumers never win unless there are restrictions placed on the merger that directly benefit  or protect the consumers.

In this case, the only people who might benefit are Sprint customers.  But these guys could just switch providers if they really needed to change providers.

I dont get this idea. Consumer never win because of a merger? Excuse me, but you would have to explain why the consumer would be better served by having 8 major carriers and the current spectrum assets split up over 8 players. We wouldn't even have 3g!. 

[red_dog007]

9 hours ago, utiz4321 said:

I dont get this idea. Consumer never win because of a merger? Excuse me, but you would have to explain why the consumer would be better served by having 8 major carriers and the current spectrum assets split up over 8 players. We wouldn't even have 3g!. 

8 major carriers? There are only 5 major spectrum holders, and one of them isn't even a carrier.  How would the New-TMobile truly benefit customers having twice the spectrum as the next holder (if they don't have to shed assets for the merger) when both TMobile and Sprint already have loads of unused or under utilized spectrum. Even VZW/ATT still have increasing speeds, with spectrum not on LTE yet and have unused / under utilized spectrum. 

Carriers are getting into unlicensed spectrum, and just between 600/AWS-3 there is still a lot of unsold licenses and plenty of the license holders are squatters. 

Edited June 30, 2018 by red_dog007

[utiz4321]

Just now, red_dog007 said:

8 major carriers? There are only 5 major spectrum holders, and one of them isn't even a carrier.  How would the New-TMobile truly benefit customers having twice the spectrum as the next holder (if they don't have to shed assets for the merger) when both TMobile and Sprint already have loads of unused or under utilized spectrum. Even VZW/ATT still have increasing speeds, with spectrum not on LTE yet or have unused / under utilized spectrum. 

Go back to 2000 and there were 8. The industry has gone through several waves of consolidation and each has been to the benefit of the consumer. 

[bigsnake49]

14 minutes ago, red_dog007 said:

8 major carriers? There are only 5 major spectrum holders, and one of them isn't even a carrier.  How would the New-TMobile truly benefit customers having twice the spectrum as the next holder (if they don't have to shed assets for the merger) when both TMobile and Sprint already have loads of unused or under utilized spectrum. Even VZW/ATT still have increasing speeds, with spectrum not on LTE yet or have unused / under utilized spectrum. 

Are you not counting the mmwave holdings of AT&T and Verizon? Or the fact that there will be a lot of spectrum that is being opened up in the CBRS, 3.7-4.2GHz, 6GHz band? 

Edited June 30, 2018 by bigsnake49