RedSpark

The problem I have with Ookla is that it relies on gathered data from within their app. My guess is that people mostly use the speed test app either when speeds are really fast or really slow, which can skew data somewhat. In the case of RootMetrics vs Nielsen, I favor RootMetrics more since they publish their methods. That said, Nielsen is great because they measure speeds based on the tasks people complete on their phone that require data usage.

 

I like to think of it this way: 

 

Rootmetrics sees carrier X has 50Mbps speeds despite their practice of slowing down speeds for watching certain media on your device and carrier Y has 20Mbps speeds.

 

Nielsen sees carrier X has 6Mbps speeds since they're lowering throughput on Netflix to compensate for a rapid increase in customers but carrier Y still has 20Mbps.

Good points. John Saw blogged about this here:

As we look at data such as NMP, we see there’s a lot of noise in the market about whose network is better, and it’s important to understand how network tests differ. Today we see three types of metrics being used by carriers:

 

1.Nielsen Mobile Performance (NMP) – NMP uses crowd-sourced data to measure actual network performance and the real customer experience. In the Oct. – Dec. timeframe NMP measured more than 75 million download events.

 

2.RootMetrics® – RootMetrics is an independent mobile analytics firm offering scientific insights into how users experience networks under real-world conditions. Using off-the-shelf smartphones, the company tests call, data, and text performance from the end-user point of view. The company’s complementary series of RootScore Reports offers a full, nation-to-neighborhood view of mobile network performance.

 

3.Ookla – With its speedtest.net app, Ookla relies on crowd-sourced data from those consumers that for whatever reason choose to conduct a speed test. This type of stress-test also measures network performance capability.

 

Using a highway analogy for speed testing, some companies stress-test networks to determine how fast a network highway is built to perform – they are testing the capability of the network in a particular moment. Nielsen, on the other hand, uses crowd-sourced data to measure how fast actual traffic on the network highway is really moving on an ongoing basis.

Yes, Verizon does hold the most #1 RootScore Awards, but what they aren’t telling you is the fact that #2, #3, and #4 are hot on their heels, and in many cases the difference between #1 and #4 is literally undiscernible to the customer. Take Houston for example. Here we’re tied for #1 in overall performance, but look closely at the difference between #1 and #4 – the gap is extremely small. Same thing in Austin, Boise, Denver….There are many examples where it’s a very close race.

 

T-Mobile relies on Ookla for its network claims, which again, measures how fast a network is built to perform, not how fast traffic is actually moving. To achieve this, Ookla collects speed tests submitted by wireless consumers and compares those speeds by operator. The downside is, unlike NMP, which latently monitors network conditions (including speed) while consumers are using their phones for their daily needs, consumers must explicitly initiate Ookla speed tests. Not many customers run their speed test apps regularly, and usually when they do, it is for diagnostics purposes - either in an area where their experience may be very bad or very good.

 

T-Mobile may currently have made their highway faster (per their Ookla-based marketing claims), but with the introduction of BingeOn, we see that cars on their highway are moving at slower speeds. All those multi-lane highways and nowhere to go because they put in speed bumps.

 

As you can also see in the above chart, as Sprint continues to build faster highways, our customers’ cars travel at higher speeds compared to the rest, which is what matters! 

 

The graph associated with that news article shows how much progress sprint has made in two years:

Sprint was definitely in a rough patch in 2014.

Anybody here planning on going to the 5G Demo at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, CA tomorrow? If so, can you take pics/vids? 

Going Broke Slowly: A Guide to Sprint’s $33 Billion Debt Dilemma

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-06-01/going-broke-slowly-a-guide-to-sprint-s-33-billion-debt-dilemma

Sprint is hit pretty hard in this piece. Of course Moffett puts in his two cents.

This is the part I don't understand about sprint. ^^ Most of our frustration comes from the ever changing deployment plan. I get it things change. However, even in our beloved forums it's still hard to watch these other carriers deploy in what seems like a blink of an eye while we wait on permits and so forth. What are they doing to make it look so easy? I recently saw an example of sprint wanting a 50ft small cell and waiting for a permit while the town bylaws already approve a smaller size so the others are getting permits at a faster rate instead of waiting for all the bs to get a special permit for what sprint wants.

 

To me it seems like one day the network is number 1 priority and the next it's not. Marcelo stated sprint would be 1 or 2 in 18/24 months network wise. It seems that might not come true due to more bumps and bruises from deploying again.

We will see the next 90 days as summer is here and a lot of work should get done.

In many cases for those other carriers, the backhaul was already in place because the investment was made a while ago.

Sprint didn't make a similar investment in backhaul way back when (under Forsee, etc.)... so here we are.

One of my favorite expressions: "If we don't change direction soon, we'll wind up where we're going".

Hopefully Sprint kicks things into high gear this summer.

Very interested to see what Sprint's plans for 5G roll out is

I am too! Hopefully the iPhone 7 has 3xCA support. It would be a real let down if it doesn't.

I imagine it would have it though. iPhone SE as Triband. iPhone 6s as 2xCA. iPhone 7 as 3xCA.

Looks like John Saw (CTO) and Gunther Ottendorfer (COO, Technology) are making an appearance at the 5G Demonstration at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, California this coming Friday: Link

So do you put 8billion towards sprints debt?

Or towards the network and try to get this densifying done faster?

Or invest in 600 spectrum?

Or try to buy one of these little guys?

 

Will be very interesting to see what son has in mind

Sprint is on track to save 1-3 billion in cost cutting and possibly get 8 bil from Dad, that's gotta make sprint stock go up with a 11bil swing... Or is that money to start making payments due soon?

SoftBank's covenants with Japanese banks preclude it from giving Sprint more money directly. (Source: http://www.wsj.com/articles/doubts-grow-about-whether-softbank-can-save-sprint-1439346616) 

However, it is able to set up and fund these 3rd party entities like Mobile Lease Co and Network Lease Co.

Isn't the 600 MHz Auction already underway?: https://auctiondata.fcc.gov/public/projects/1000

Also see this page for background: https://www.fcc.gov/about-fcc/fcc-initiatives/incentive-auctions

Recap of Tarek Robbiati's comments today: http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/sprint-cfo-we-will-lease-some-spectrum-assets-spectrum-leaseco-within-next/2016-05-25

"We are at a point where the majority of our traffic is carried on our 2.5 spectrum," he said. "In two years what has happened is that the deployment of 2.5, the deployment of carrier aggregation software, allowed us to rebalance our traffic dramatically between all the LTE bands, including 1900 and 2500 [MHz]. And so that changes the customer experience because when the customer is able to use two-carrier aggregation on 2.5, then the customer experience in terms of speed is fundamentally different."

This is especially interesting considering the makeup of devices on Sprint's network. See Page 5 of the Quarterly Investor Update for the distribution of Triband and CA-capable devices on Sprint.

Tri-band LTE phones represented 69 percent of the 25.3 million ending postpaid phone connection base compared to 37 percent at the end of the year-ago quarter and 64 percent at the end of the prior quarter. During the quarter, 90 percent of postpaid phones sold were tri-band.

Carrier aggregation capable phones, which allow for higher data speeds, were 74 percent of postpaid phones sold during the quarter, increasing the number of these phones within the phone base to 28 percent.

More recap of Tarek Robbiati's comments today: http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/sprint-cfo-we-will-lease-some-spectrum-assets-spectrum-leaseco-within-next/2016-05-25

Robbiati explained that deploying small cell sites costs 60 to 70 percent less than deploying larger macro cell sites. "You don't have to spend a lot of money in a 5G world to create a 5G network, especially if you have a huge amount of spectrum," he said. "You've got to deploy them differently with cheaper cost structures to maintain … doing it the old way is not going to work."

Transcript will likely be available here soon: http://seekingalpha.com/symbol/S/transcripts

UPDATE: Transcript is live: http://seekingalpha.com/article/3977755-sprint-s-management-presents-44th-annual-j-p-morgan-global-technology-media-telecom

Anybody else tuning into the event featuring Tarek Robbiati (Sprint CFO) starting shortly? (Scheduled for Today at 8:40AM ET)

http://investors.sprint.com/news-and-events/past-events/event-details/2016/JP-Morgan-Global-Technology-Media-and-Telecom-Conference/default.aspx

Snazzy hold music...

See Page 5 of the Quarterly Investor Update for the distribution of Triband and CA-capable devices on Sprint.

Tri-band LTE phones represented 69 percent of the 25.3 million ending postpaid phone connection base compared to 37 percent at the end of the year-ago quarter and 64 percent at the end of the prior quarter. During the quarter, 90 percent of postpaid phones sold were tri-band.

Carrier aggregation capable phones, which allow for higher data speeds, were 74 percent of postpaid phones sold during the quarter, increasing the number of these phones within the phone base to 28 percent.

Thoughts on what he'll say?

Sprint CFO Tarek Robbiati to Speak May 25th at the J.P. Morgan 44th Annual Global Technology, Media and Telecom (TMT) Conference

 

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (BUSINESS WIRE), May 18, 2016 - Sprint (NYSE: S) Chief Financial Officer Tarek Robbiati will speak at the J.P. Morgan 44th Annual Global Technology, Media and Telecom (TMT) Conference in Boston, Ma., on Wednesday, May 25 at 8:40 a.m. ET.

A live audio webcast of this session may be accessed at www.sprint.com/investors. A replay will be available shortly after the actual presentation time.

Some interesting news on how Sprint's been preparing its network for the upcoming Republican Convention in Cleveland and Democratic Convention in Philadelphia:

Network Preparations in Full Swing for Republican and Democratic National Conventions

Looks like the 2 Year Contract is being killed off on May 24th:

Sprint will kill off two-year contracts for the second time on May 24

Not available for new accounts

Yes (Reactive) for Upgrades and Add-a-line

How will this apply to Best Buy, Costco, etc.?

Looks like Sprint's Wireline side has made a strong turnaround since being launched as a separate division:

Sprint's Fitz on revamping wireline's identity, Ethernet, managed services growth

Fitz: It's nearly impossible to separate the wireline and wireless business because it's the same backbone. I don't know how you would do it and it's the core to running our wireless business, too. Wireless is my anchor tenant customer. It's very important that I serve that business and serve it well. There are selfish reasons to want to have a focus on wireline business that goes beyond our external customer business: it's to make sure I am investing in driving an efficiently run, cost effective core for the sake of wireless as well.

Fitz: It absolutely will, and we have already seen it. We've been operating this way for a few months, but it has taken us a while to carve out the team and get them focused. I have had some of my team members focused on this for a couple of months. April for us was our best month ever in the history of wireline in terms of selling new ports and circuits on our network. It has been in decline for a while, but in terms of new fiber-based Ethernet services it was our best month ever. We're confident of the indication of the focus on this business. It was also the best month of selling our managed services.

Very encouraging!.,..

Sprint is going all-in on Copa America:

Sprint Provides Exclusive Free Access with No Data Charges to Every Live Match of 2016 Copa América Centenario with fuboTV

Also:

In addition, Sprint will conduct 5G demonstrations on June 3 and June 6 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara and on June 9, 11 and 14 at Lincoln Field in Philadelphia.

Anyone here planning to go?

More info on Sprint's Copa Sponsorship/Contests/Promotions here: https://www.sprint.com/copa

Sprint CFO Tarek Robbiati to Speak May 25th at the J.P. Morgan 44th Annual Global Technology, Media and Telecom (TMT) Conference

Hopefully we get a nice update on Sprint's progress since the Earnings Call.

I'm glad they're going in-house. The big problem with agencies is that stakeholder priorities aren't always aligned.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

However, there's a risk of having an "echo chamber" where the branding/messaging sounds good in-house, but doesn't translate well outside for media/customers/prospects. Remember that it was Yellow Fan Studios that brought us the now infamous Listening Tour "Ghetto Moment" on YouTube.

Sprint is pursuing "a bold new creative strategy":

Sprint Names Exec Creative Director to Run New In-House Agency

 

In his new role, Mr. Bennett will oversee the creative direction of Sprint, which the company said will be taking a new direction in 2016. He is "is the new leader of Sprint's creative vision for 2016," the company said in an email. "Whether in public relations or the political arena, the music business or digital media, his award-winning, 20-year career as a creative communicator is as eclectic as it is unique."

 

At YellowFan, Mr. Bennett will pursue "a bold new creative strategy" this year, including a "re-imagination" of social media, branded content, experiential marketing "and an exciting new focus on consumer storytelling," Sprint said. The agency "has full creative responsibility for the Overland Park, Kan.-based mobile carrier providing film and print production, design and all other creative services," it said.

Sounds good to me!

I do believe backhaul pricing and availability has negatively impacted Sprint's growth and profitability. There is no question that supplying backhaul for your competitor (from ATT and Verizon) caused "delays" and price gauging.

 

I do not believe Tmobile was viewed as a real competitor when they first started deploying fiber and hence wasn't such a big deal, whereas V and ATT clearly saw Sprint as a formidable opponent.

The FCC has looked into this issue:

FCC moves forward with special access reforms, marking a win for T-Mobile and Sprint

The Commission voted 3-2 along party lines to approve an order prohibiting ILECs (incumbent local exchange carriers) such as Verizon and AT&T from charging early termination fees from T-Mobile, Sprint, or other major users of fixed-line services. The order also bars "demand lock-up contracts" that prevent customers from seeking alternative sources for such connectivity, and calls for the creation of a "new technology-neutral framework" that would extend regulations in markets deemed uncompetitive.

The FCC specifically called out AT&T, Verizon, CenturyLink and Frontier, saying an investigation had found "certain terms and conditions" to be unjust and unreasonable and had the effect of decreasing competition and slowing the transition to new technologies. "These companies will be required to withdraw the illegal terms of these tariffs and file new tariffs within 60 days of release of the Order," the Commission wrote.

Nope. Far too expensive. The last mile providers will transport the days to sprint link.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5X

It's far too expensive? I'm sorry, but I don't understand the economics here well. Sprint wouldn't save money over the long term by bringing more of its backhaul in house "at cost" instead of writing checks in perpetuity to AT&T/Verizon for it?

Sprint Telecom landlines are separate from Sprint the cell phone provider. Sprint itself has almost no last mile connections to cell sites. 

Do you ever see this changing in the future with the planned macro site and small cite expansions?

Seems like Sprint would save money over the long term running its own fiber backhaul to these sites vs paying AT&T/Verizon.... and Marcelo has said that he wanted to stop writing checks to his competitors for roaming...

Along the same lines?

Saw this Article on FierceTelecom:

Sprint ropes in Ethernet over Copper, Ethernet over DOCSIS into Ethernet strategy

Would these Sprint circuits ever be run/used as backhaul for the CommScope S1000 Small Cells for In-Building Wireless Coverage, or would those Small Cells instead depend on customer provided backhaul?

Yeah it's truly difficult to read whether it's best LTE Plus or fair LTE on the map, it's crazy how similar the shades are

Has anyone here reached out to Marcelo about this?

Can we have a separate thread for people to argue about 5G?

S5GRU?