bigsnake49

45 minutes ago, dkyeager said:

Because they plan to dump most Sprint sites (most of which are co-sites). They need to get to being one network, one accounting system etc as soon as possible since those areas are where the synergy is.  Failing to do so quickly will crush their capex, since it is paid for from profits rather than a sugar daddy or smoke and mirrors. You want everyone focused on achieving a few simple objectives.

Still going to take them 2 years. Capex is not going to kill them if all they're doing is adding band 41 to 65,000 sites, what's going to kill them is adding 10-15000 new sites and rebuilding Sprint sites as T-mobile sites.

Already offloads 75% of data load to WiFi so it does not make financial sense to invest in a macro network.  Said that they might be interested in bidding in the CBRS and C-Band auctions.

https://www.fiercewireless.com/operators/charter-not-looking-to-be-full-scale-facilities-based-mobile-operator-cfo

I wonder if they are interested in hosting both of those bands in post and strand mounted small cells as a neutral host. I have no idea why Comcast bid in the 600MHz auction other than to lease it to a carrier and get roaming on the cheap. Right now they are leasing it to T-Mobile and I am assuming that that would be the play going forward.

1 hour ago, dewbertdc said:

I'm a T-Mobile customer who works in a building with a Sprint DAS, but not a T-Mobile one.  When I had Fi, there was no elegant handoff between the two - I either had to wait for the phone to realize T-Mobile was gone and switch to Sprint manually, or force the switch with a dialer code.

I'm hopeful we'll hear more about network integration on or around "Day 1," in August, when the Sprint brand is officially sunset.  It'll be great when I can get on that DAS and not have to rely on a prepaid SIM in my office (whenever we return, which may not be until 2021 from what I'm hearing)

My experience with Fi was the reverse of that. Mine switched between the two without waiting for one to have no service before switching to the other one, but then I had one of the Google handsets. 

2 hours ago, dewbertdc said:

The Fi method is also a kludgey hack - the SIM actually has 4 phone numbers assigned to it, one on T-Mobile (your primary Fi number), and three "ghost" numbers for each of Sprint, USCC and Three UK, and the Fi app switches between them based on your location and signal strength.  It's a neat trick, but it's a lot of overhead that T-Mobile isn't interested in adding as it's just going to integrate Sprint sites and spectrum into its existing network.

I am sure that they can come up with a much more elegant solution than the Google Fi one. The integration of spectrum and and sites will  take about 2 years. Meanwhile the current method of waiting to have no service before switching to the other network is deeply unsatisfactory.

It seems that Dish will close the Boost transaction on July 1st:

The company did not officially close the purchase, nor did it provide any of the parameters of the pending deal, including how many customers might be involved or the final price.

But the company's announcement – made via an SEC filing – represents Dish's intention to enter the wireless industry, first as an MVNO of T-Mobile and, potentially, as a nationwide 5G network operator.

It appears that the Department of Justice had to step in during the negotiations between T-Mobile and Dish to push the transaction forward. "On June 17, 2020, the Department of Justice (the 'DOJ') determined that T-Mobile has complied with the requirement in the final judgment entered by a federal district court in Washington, D.C. on April 1, 2020 (the 'Final Judgment') to provide Dish the ability to cross-provision any new or existing customer of the prepaid business with a compatible handset onto the T-Mobile network," T-Mobile wrote in its own SEC filing on the matter. "As a result, we believe all conditions to closing under the Asset Purchase Agreement (other than those conditions that can only be satisfied at closing) have been satisfied and, subject to the satisfaction of the conditions that must be satisfied at closing, the closing of the Prepaid Business Sale will occur on July 1, 2020."

https://www.lightreading.com/5g/dish-said-it-will-buy-t-mobiles-boost-on-july-1/d/d-id/761784?

All of you can breathe now 😅!

Why has it taken T-Mobile so long to implement something like Google Fi that selects the best network/band among T-Mobile, Sprint and USCC? I mean they only had 2 years?

I am here to declare that I was not one of the million people.

New T-Mobile MMIMO panels are 128x128. Legacy Sprint are 64x64 split between B41 and N41.

31 minutes ago, Terrell352 said:

Somebody talk to me here. Is this massive mimo or mmwave?

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MMwave, the NR41 and B41 MMIMO panels are a bit bigger than that but still square.

19 hours ago, dkyeager said:

5G is the focus because it is really the only item that is required by the FCC for the merger. We could say the speed targets are related to density, but could also be achieved by reducing the number of customers. Doubt the later is their plan, but if T-Mobile/Sprint becomes the next Sprint/Nextel merger...

You could end up with an empty 5G network and a overcrowded 4G network and then you will have to subsidize your customers moving to  5G handsets. You better be able to share your M-MIMO between LTE and NR either through EN-DC or through DSS or you will have a lot of unhappy Sprint customers. You also better integrate band 2/25 quickly.

I will keep repeating myself, I hope they prioritize the integration of the LTE network over the deployment of 5G. There are not a lot of S20 customers right now and probably close to 120M of LTE customers. Give your current customers a reason to stay by optimizing access to both networks for customers.

Uh oh:

Ergen, one of corporate America’s toughest negotiators, may force T-Mobile to find another buyer for its Boost Mobile prepaid service, sources close to the deal say. As FOX Business first reported on Tuesday, Ergen was looking to renegotiate the terms of its wholesale agreement to purchase Boost with T-Mobile, including Boost’s $1.4 billion price tag.

T-Mobile’s divestiture of Boost to Dish was one of the U.S. Department of Justice’smandates in order for the Antitrust Division to greenlight the merger of Sprint Corp with T-Mobile. It was also a key component of the wholesale agreement, which allows Dish to use T-Mobile’s network for seven years as it builds out its own 5G network.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/t-mobile-might-forced-buyer-001054539.html

Ergen better not overplay his hand or he will have to give back the spectrum and he might as well kiss his roaming deal with T-Mobile goodbye.

As some of you remember, Cox has flirted with wireless for a long time. They were part of the Pivot MVNO outlining the Sprint network. The they were part of SpectrumCo that acquired a nationwide 10x10MHz spectrum that was then sold to Verizon. Then Independently they acquired 700Mhz spectrum that was then sold to AT&T and USCC. They also acquired AWS spectrum that Now it seems that they want to reenter the fray. They can always become a Verizon MVNO like their Cableco cohorts. 

Cox's interest in pursuing mobile again is underscored by some recent postings by the company and its employees. Cox's Tony Krueck wrote on LinkedIn four months ago that he is "establishing and leading the team to design, develop, and launch a retail wireless line of business for Cox Communications." And recent Cox job postings mention a "newly introduced Cox Mobile wireless offering" and a "Retail Wireless Services launch."

Cox also is among a number of cable companies that have registered to bid in the FCC's upcoming CBRS 3.5GHz spectrum auction. There are widespread indications that Charter and others are considering using that spectrum to construct their own mobile networks in select locations. Their goal would be to reduce the amount of money they pay to their MVNO partners by offloading their customers' mobile traffic onto their own CBRS networks.

https://www.lightreading.com/cable-video/cox-readies-a-re-entry-into-mobile/d/d-id/761585?

The FCC Tuesday released a list of entities that have registered their interest in participating in the agency's auction of CBRS 3.5GHz midband spectrum, currently scheduled to start July 23. Noteworthy names among potential bidders include AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Charter Communications, Dish Network, Cox Communications, Comcast, CenturyLink and others.

The auction appears to have drawn interest from entities not typically associated with spectrum bidders. For example, other names that appear among the FCC's filings include oil and gas companies like Chevron and Occidental Petroleum, tower company CellTex, fiber company Corning, agriculture equipment supplier John Deere, and the universities of Kentucky, Texas A&M and Virginia, as well as Duke University and Health System.

https://www.lightreading.com/5g/verizon-atandt-charter-cox-dish-among-cbrs-auction-bidders/d/d-id/761573?

44 minutes ago, JimBob said:

Was hoping for deeper analysis from the article.

Why is DISH possibly stalling: do they not have the money to close the deal and/or they can't operationally handle taking over Boost as a company at this time?

No, usually deals close on quarter boundaries. I am sure that the hold up is that Dish wants better lease terms their spectrum and probably wants to pay for Boost with the 600Mhz lease money thus paying no cash for their Boost purchase. But in their latest filing, T-Mobile was only interested in leasing 56 of 486 licenses (possibly just dense urban areas). So instead of $350M/Year they will only get $135M/Year. Ergen is a tough negotiator so stay tuned.

Also as the article mentioned, there is the issue of what network should Boost be targeting and how to accomplish it. Remember that Boost customers have Sprint compatible phones. Some of them also are T-mobile compatible but not all, so Boost customers have the same the same problem that Sprint customers face, namely that the two networks are not integrated.

Analysts are bringing up some questions as to when is the sale of Boost to Dish is going to close and when is the lease of Dish's 600Mhz spectrum to T-Mobile going to to be signed and under what terms. I guess we will find out soon.

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/dish-s-boost-closing-where-it-analysts

How would you go about deploying Dish's spectrum? Here are my ideas:

1. Conduct a geographic survey of where the Boost customers are

2. Start deploying the spectrum in the  cities and areas with the highest concentration 

3. Minimize tower climbs - deploy all the spectrum all at once

4. Incentivize Boost customers to upgrade to 5G phones

5. PROFIT😂

1 hour ago, dkyeager said:

Wider bandwidth has less interference issues and is stronger at the edge. The issue is getting everyone to go along with it.

B26's nationwide aspect is great, but it is slimmed down near some major Canadian cities. From NE Ohio to Rochester NY is 1x800 only.  A few other areas with 3x3 only, 3x3 plus 1x800, or 5x5 only.

I have been told that b26 was originally going to be 10x10, but was paired back after the 9/11 Commission report. Now that we have band 14 it might be time for another look at nearby spectrum use by the FCC. 

I am all for consolidating public safety in the 700Mhz LMR voice band. They should have done that before trying to reband in the 800Mhz SMR band. The FCC totally f'ed it up.

38 minutes ago, Tengen31 said:

I don't get why TMO wouldn't want it. It's still only 5x5 just like B12 and available in places they don't own B12 and would benefit customers that still don't have B71 devices. TMO still has iPhone 6s users

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I think they will use 800MHz for little while longer. I am not saying all of this will happen right now. I am talking about things that should happen over the next 2-3 years. But T-Mobile wants to have everybody on new 5G phones as soon as possible. If I am T-Mobile and I can get Comcast to sign a long term lease in return for a roaming agreement then I'd probably want to sell the 700Mhz spectrum as well and consolidate on 600Mhz. 

14 minutes ago, Tengen31 said:

I don't get why TMO wouldn't want it. It's still only 5x5 just like B12 and available in places they don't own B12 and would benefit customers that still don't have B71 devices. TMO still has iPhone 6s users

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Too much trouble for what it is. Yet another low frequency to support with RRHs. They already have 600/700 RRHs. If they can sell it to somebody for $3.5B they can turn around and buy or lease more 600Mhz from Comcast and Columbia Capital. Right now they have a 600/700 RRH and band 2/band 66 RRH and are adding a band 41 MIMO RRH. If they add a 800RRH that's 4 RRHs per side plus the panels. You're going to have to stiffen the platform.

18 hours ago, iansltx said:

...which would be B26. Just like "reconfiguring B4 to include extended frequencies" resulted in B66.

FWIW the slice of B26 Sprint uses for LTE is right next to the bottom of B5, with a center frequency of 821.3 MHz on the uplink. That leaves 200 KHz between the top of the "advertised" 5 MHz LTE band (actually a bit more than that because as I recall a 5 MHz LTE carrier has 500 KHz of guard band built in) and where CLR starts. Then the 1xA carrier Sprint's using runs below that, rounding out their use of the 7x7 of SMR they have.

Catch here is, you'd have to reband the entirety of CLR + SMR to get what amounts to 5 MHz of extra spectrum over what's available in CLR + SMR right now...and that would have to happen across everyone in the band. 'cuz right now you have 10x10 + 10x10 + 5x5...potentially even better spectrum usage for folks who are shimming a 1x channel or some GSM in there (Verizon or rural carriers). You're not just dealing with all three major carriers.

At which point you only benefit spectrum-wise if you drop from three carriers to two in the band...and you can get to two carriers in the band with one of them having 15x15 without rebanding. Hard sell when the two carriers you'd see in that band already have B12 and B13 networks.

I'd much rather see Dish hold onto that spectrum, shunt all LTE users to B12, and replace the B26 carrier with 5x5 NR. T-Mobile can rent the remaining 2 MHz back from Dish for 1xA until they shut down CDMA entirely, allowing T-Mo to drop PCS CDMA (RIP) more quickly. Phones have had SMR CDMA for 8+ years at this point so switching PCS CDMA off shouldn't be a big deal at all. T-Mobile can use the existing ex-Sprint equipment to run the network on the cell sites they're keeping since you don't need nearly the density for 1x on SMR that you need for anything at PCS or higher.

Yes, this assumes Dish will actually launch a network. Holding out hope that that does indeed happen.

Right now you have a total of 12.5x12.5 of cellular spectrum for each cellular carrier. You have 7 MHz of ESMR. You could have 30 Mhz of band 26 owned by the cellular carriers and couple of Mhz for guard bands. T-Mobile does not want the band 26 and neither does Dish. Otherwise Dish would not have an option, they would have a firm agreement. 

I personally don't think Dish will buy the SMR spectrum from Sprint. 

13 hours ago, jakeliford said:

Darn that stinks. I just got mine setup using the LTE backhaul and i'm getting pretty decent service.  Still can't use it to make a call no VOLTE however it is nice to be able to use the LTE for my phones and spare the WIFI for other devices.  

I got the same message and until they actually take away the 2.5GHz backhaul, I will use it.

5 minutes ago, Tengen31 said:

SMR doesn't cover B5, so those carriers would have to do B26

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I know that, they would have to reconfigure band 5 to include SMR.

When they turn off the band 41 backhaul then Maybe I will hook it up to my home network. Meanwhile it will stay on it. Hopefully T-Mobile optimizes their network to pick the best connection instead of switching to T-Mobile when the Sprint network has no service as it does now.