RedSpark

Looking forward to seeing this on Sprint. Hopefully WiFi Calling is supported on it. At least there's a "My Sprint" App for BYOD now.

Linked from this Tweet (https://twitter.com/walkermarka/status/868479835705888769) which was retweeted by Günther.

You could try requesting a new Sprint site here: https://www.sprintsitesusa.com/links/cellsite1

Interesting theory. However, Sprint is still paying AT&T for Roaming....

https://twitter.com/marceloclaure/status/867750781570646019 Yikes. Shots fired.

Sprint needs to get back to its Top Ten S*** List for sites and knock those out every day. https://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.”"

VoLTE is supported on iPhone 6 and later: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203078 We'll see how far back Sprint goes for enabling it on iPhones.

Thanks for the info on that. I'm guessing it's paid all at once for Installments at that point?

How many sites didn't have Clear equipment? Is the pace of 8T8R equipment upgrades rate limited by Funds or Equipment Availability?

How is sales tax handled? For Leases it's broken up over months. For Monthly Installments it's paid upfront.

It seems there are two kinds of units: https://support.t-mobile.com/docs/DOC-14947 Window unit Takes T-Mobile signal from outside the window and sends it to the coverage unit, where it can be rebroadcast throughout the home. Should be placed in a well ventilated area with the strongest and most reliable 4G LTE signal. Coverage unit Rebroadcasts T-Mobile's signal throughout the home. Should be placed in a well ventilated area to provide the best and most in home coverage.

You have a good point, but I'm not only specifically referring to cornfields. In DC, we've got a substantial number of towers that don't have 2CA or Band 41 at all, according to a Glance report that was shared with me a few weeks back during an outage of several towers. I have an iPhone 7, so I can't tell if 3xCA has been deployed, but others here have said it hasn't been deployed widely given equipment issues. Given what Marcelo said, I wonder if he and Brian Hedlund (DC/MD/VA manager) are on the same page about the network in this area.

Why wasn't the funding there for those regions? That directly contradicts what Marcelo said at the conference about not having constraints on CapEx. Something isn't adding up here.

How does the coverage of 1,000 8T8R sites compare to 3,000 Mini Macros? Also, 8T8R is a much more future proof structure, capable of supporting 3CA.

Marcelo did say "We plan to deploy millions of Magic Boxes."... If that's really true, that Giant sounds like it could be a candidate for one. As for why Sprint's signal isn't getting in there, perhaps Band 26 is at low power or maybe there's some other reason that the signal isn't propagating well from the Clear site. I've had this experience myself at a number of locations where the Sprint signal simply dies going inside while other carriers seem to just hum along. I don't get it... but what I've done is tell those businesses about the Magic Box and they've put in requests.

You should talk to the manager at the Giant about requesting a Magic Box for the store. You could also hit up Corporate (http://giantfood.com/contact_us/) about it and explain what it is and how shoppers like yourself would have a better store experience. Given Marcelo's comments about CapEx, is the Clear gear still around due to 8T8R equipment delays or funding limitations?

What's the 3xCA deployment plan for markets with existing Samsung 2xCA gear? Wait until it breaks or upgrade it now? How much 3xCA is actually being deployed? Sprint has previously said this: https://www.wirelessweek.com/news/2017/01/sprint-enables-3-carrier-aggregation-more-devices (January 31, 2017) "While two-channel carrier aggregation is available in more than 250 markets nationwide, Sprint said three-channel carrier aggregation is now available in more than 100 markets, with expanded deployments on the way." Marcelo's comment about not being "constrained on CapEx" has really got me trying to get my head around how Sprint is (or is not) spending money on equipment upgrades.

FYI, Webcast should be available here: https://jpmorgan.metameetings.net/events/tmt17/general_signin

Great info. Is acquiring 8T8R eNB equipment a CapEx funding issue or equipment availability issue?

Marcelo made some interesting comments on pricing: https://www.wirelessweek.com/news/2017/05/sprint-ceo-sees-price-increases-necessity-healthy-wireless-industry Sprint head Marcelo Claure on Monday argued carriers will need to rip off the band-aid and raise prices in the coming years. “In order for this industry to be healthy, I think eventually all carriers will have to increase prices in next few years as data consumption increases,” Claure said. Hmmm. What's Sprint's plan? Add-on's for 4K Streaming? ------------ “We don’t capture a lot of three, four, five (line) customers. So to us we look at it like two for $90,” he said. Claure noted that any customers on lines three through five the carrier can pull in will pay full price after one year. But the whole point, he said, is to price service competitively enough to provide an incentive for family switchers. Claure pointed out families tend to stay longer with one carrier and have a better churn profile than single line customers. “As we bring customers, they come and they’re willing to stay, that’s why last year was the best churn the company has had in many years,” he said. “In this case, we’re moving entire families from Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile. They come for one year free, lines three, four, and five, and then after that they stay.” Interesting way to look at it.

https://twitter.com/marceloclaure/status/867080048632836102 Good on you Marcelo.

I wonder how long term those mini-macros are meant for. 3/4/5xCA seems like it's going to have to come from upgraded Macro Sites... and Sprint doesn't seem to have invested in many of those new sites for densification from what I can tell. Mini Macros and Magic Boxes don't put out those higher order CA.

Comcast has Xfinity Mobile with Verizon... rule them out?

Marcelo was basically saying he wanted things to be done efficiently... but reading it again, there's more to it. "So that’s a huge misconception. We have never had a capital constrain as it relates to spending CapEx. What -- we were always challenge with, I says, is there really a need to spend as much as everybody else to create a great network experience and I think that’s a huge misconception of the industry that you set up a cap and I have seen even in -- within my team, you set up a CapEx budget and then people fight hard to go spend that money. And in many cases without need or they go by gear or they try to do unnatural things in order to basically hit that CapEx number." So he was really concerned about wasteful spending by his own network teams... and I think that slowed upgrades in a number of markets even when money was available. "We plan to deploy millions of Magic Boxes." Millions? Does Airspan have the production capacity for this?

Every time there's a tower outage, I hope they replace the gear entirely instead of fixing it. A few weeks ago, there was a cluster of towers out around me in the heart of D.C. It was pretty awful. Someone pulled up Glance for me and I was surprised to hear that a number of towers in downtown lacked 2xCA or even Band 41. Marcelo himself said that Sprint was not constrained on CapEx... So is this old gear still around due to equipment/vendor delays?