Boosted20V

Seeking alpha usually writes pretty good articles about Sprint's finances. I'm not a finance guy by any stretch but the gist ( jist?) of the article for me is that Sprint needs to show it can consistently add subscribers in 2015 for investors to become more bull(ish).

Seeking Alpha doesn't write any articles. Individual contributors do so you're at the mercy of the author.

T-Mobile is made up of what used to be regional carriers. Omnipoint was one of them.

Anyone see any Band 41 deployed in Shentel areas yet? Curious if they will be launching it in York, PA anytime soon

Nothing yet in Harrisburg.

Their liquidity is Softbank.

I don't see Softbank injecting cash any time soon. They have stated they WOULD if need be but are not immediately planning on it. Sprint is in a decent position to weather the current storm with the cash on hand and this deal which was just announced.

What liquidity? Sprint has been negative FCF every quarter for some time now. And the operating cash reserves dipped into the red late last year.

FCF can help liquidity but it isn't the definition of liquidity. Sprint has cash and short-term investments on hand of 8.8 billion as of Sept 30th. They've been eating into that as you highlight but it is still liquid assets they can draw upon. This highlights the exact reason they want that cash as a backstop and would rather use vendor financing.

I don't see how cause

 

As of Sept. 30 2014, Sprint’s total cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments were $5.3 billion and its total liquidity position was $8.8 billion.

I think the answer to your question is Sprint's management would rather not eat into their liquidity position and would rather take on vendor financing to pay for it in the mean-time.

EDIT - The liquidity is nice to have when you're entering into a price war.

So they're selling the 2.5 ghz? Selling to TMObile would result in least pain for sprint.

He was quite clear it was VERY early and they may not actually sell any but are reviewing the feasibility and what they require.

And given his comment regarding adds and the porting ratios Legere mentioned between Sprint and T-Mobile, VZ and T are bleeding customers.

I just caught the end but he said they were in preliminary stages of reviewing if they should sell some of their spectrum assets.

Thank you. Considering buying one as a gift for someone on my family plan but didn't want to get screwed.

Question, the unlocked iPhone 6's Apple is now selling directly CAN in fact be activated by Sprint? The delay for unlocked devices is only those from another provider, correct?

LTE800 is alive and well throughout the southern LV. Filled in gaps nicely near Lehigh St. on I78.

B41 live in Coopersburg / Quakertown. Pulled ~30 mbps.

How much was clear wire bought for? Cheap compared to this especially since multiple carriers of 20mhz and up to three carrier aggregation.

I don't think the price of CLWR was a fair comparison given the control Sprint had over CLWR and their board. Effectively no other company could have bought CLWR due to Sprint's controlling interest.

Clearly Sprint is vindicated in deploying WiMax to retain the 2.5Ghz licenses given the prices we're seeing for AWS. Not that anyone really doubted this, however, it shows how valuable that spectrum position is.

B41 live at the corner of 33 and 191. This was one of the first sites to get NV upgrades as well. Unnecessary capacity at the location however, very rural. Passed by on my way to East Stroudsburg today.

Shentel Results

Continuing to add customers. 18% of customers have tri-band phones. Added 5,303 postpaid customers in the quarter. Returned to a net importer of customers with ports-in exceeding ports-out from VZ and ATT. 20% market share.

532 sites in total

84% of sites have 2 LTE carriers (second carrier being made up of 5% at 1900 , 95% at 800)

8% of sites have 3 carriers of LTE using 20mhz of 1900 and 10mhz of 800.

70% of all traffic LTE.

AVG usage of 3.3GB per month per LTE user which is significantly higher than other companies report. Seems to indicate if there is capacity customers will use it. EVDO usage is flat. 800 voice on 93% of towers.

I get the feeling Shentel may attempt to buy or merge with nTelos. They made it a point to say "While we won't comment on any particular acquisition opportunity, we remain open to any which make strategic sense as well as being open to a mutually beneficial expansion on our relationship with Sprint.” Seems to be pretty pointed to me.

Identified 125 sites to deploy 2.5GHz on. Will begin to deploy in 2015. Sites will be prepared to launch on by early next year (i.e. backhaul). $150k - $175k per site to set up. For the most part in metro areas but also will deploy to rest areas/truck stops along I81/PA Turnpike where demand is high.

Identified 125 sites to deploy 2.5GHz on. Will begin to deploy in 2015. Sites will be prepared to launch on by early next year (i.e. backhaul). $150k - $175k per site to set up. For the most part in metro areas but also will deploy to rest areas/truck stops along I81/PA Turnpike where demand is high.

Shentel Results

Continuing to add customers. 18% of customers have tri-band phones. Added 5,303 postpaid customers in the quarter. Returned to a net importer of customers with ports-in exceeding ports-out from VZ and ATT. 20% market share.

532 sites in total

84% of sites have 2 LTE carriers (second carrier being made up of 5% at 1900 , 95% at 800)

8% of sites have 3 carriers of LTE using 20mhz of 1900 and 10mhz of 800.

70% of all traffic LTE.

AVG usage of 3.3GB per month per LTE user which is significantly higher than other companies report. Seems to indicate if there is capacity customers will use it. EVDO usage is flat. 800 voice on 93% of towers.

I get the feeling Shentel may attempt to buy or merge with nTelos. They made it a point to say "While we won't comment on any particular acquisition opportunity, we remain open to any which make strategic sense as well as being open to a mutually beneficial expansion on our relationship with Sprint.” Seems to be pretty pointed to me.

It shrinks???

 

 

 

AJ

This episode JUST ended on TBS.

Sprint is going to have to spend a good bit on backhaul given that even a gigabit link won't be enough to support B25/B26 and multiple B41 carriers.

I thought 8T8R was supposed to have speeds like 60+?

I'd say that depends on load and backhaul.

Yup.

I miss my old unlimited plan, could have done more speedtests! I did 2 when on B41 and both averaged ~30mbps which is a far cry from the .01 mbps I used to get on 3G in the dark days in Allentown. It's amazing to finally see Sprint have the technology in place to deploy all of their spectrum resources. It's an interesting contrast being in a Shentel market normally. While Shentel doesn't have the lows I've encountered in some Sprint corporate areas over the years, they also don't have the highs that Sprint currently has with B41.

So is it safe to assume that the B41 in the Lehigh Valley are 8t8r sites since no legacy Clearwire was deployed there? Also, I got consistent B26 through the west side of Bethlehem. All in all the network has made some pretty staggering progress.

B41 on Airport Rd in Allentown.