 mobOn the next level..Premium
join:2000-10-07 | It will be It will be exactly like Sprint/Nextel if the deal goes through. |
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 tiger72SexaT duorPPremium
join:2001-03-28
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | said by mob:It will be exactly like Sprint/Nextel if the deal goes through.
LOL.
Sprint had an interest in keeping iDen around due to Direct Connect. It then wasn't sure if it wanted to refarm iden or turn it into their low-cost network (Boost originally). Of course, this pissed off their expensive Nextel customers who had degraded service thanks to the Boost influx. Finally, some 5 years later, Sprint decided that they should shutter the iDen network in a few years, and then refarm the spectrum.. you know... eventually.
In contrast, T-Mobile has no interest in keeping CDMA2000 around. Metro's network doesn't even use EvDO. That makes it both inefficient and technically worse on all merits. T-Mobile has stated since day 1 that they want to move CDMA customers to HSPA+ so they can refarm CDMA for even more HSPA+.
Unlike Sprint with iDen, there's no reason T-Mobile would have to keep CDMA around. It needs spectrum, and the longer CDMA sits on that spectrum, the longer they languish. Considering their numerous spectrum-grabs over the year, as well as aggressive spectrum refarm, as well as unlimited data push, they certainly seem to know where they want to go (again, unlike Sprint when it bought Nextel).
TL;DR
I fell for ze trolling.
--
"What makes us omniscient? Have we a record of omniscience? ...If we can't persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we'd better reexamine our reasoning."
-United States Secretary of Defense (1961-1968) Robert S. McNamara |
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Sammer
join:2005-12-22
Canonsburg, PA | reply to mob
said by mob:It will be exactly like Sprint/Nextel if the deal goes through.
It's completely different because Deutsche Telekom's motives are completely different. This deal is about spectrum and turning a wholly owned subsidiary into a stock (26% to MetroPCS shareholders that can be publicly traded, 74% that Deutsche Telekom can sell or spin off whenever it wants) company. |
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| reply to mob
said by mob:It will be exactly like Sprint/Nextel if the deal goes through.
No, it won't. It will be like the AT&T/Cingular merger where customers were slowly migrated from the "Blue to Orange" network. That went off relatively well.
Sprint's downfall was they tried to operate both a CDMA and an iDEN network with no plans to shutter either. Both networks suffered as a result. |
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| reply to tiger72
The only problem I think they'll have is that prepaid customers buy new phones much less frequently than postpaid, so getting all of the cdma users upgraded to HSPA+/LTE phones will take quite awhile. Prepaid doesn't offer phone subsidies so you can't even give away free phones to MetroPCS customers.
They will have to get inventive to upgrade those MetroPCS customers |
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| reply to mob
No it won't. Sprint NEVER tried to move customers from one network to the other. Instead they allowed customers to move between them. Sprint set it up to fail, maybe even hoping they'd be bought up. But in the end, they failed and still are feeling those affects. They maybe trying to still turn around, but they are far from really improving. They won't be able to do that until they start bringing in some HUGE amounts of money and their recent beatings over LTE is just the start of the company going down again.
Sprint used to pride itself with the street level coverage map, but now moving away from it? Seems crazy to me since others are now going to it. Sprint will never be the company they were at one time. But if they brought back a TON of their CSRs including the Nextel reps - who knew what they were doing- they'd improve much more. But that won't happen. |
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| reply to MovieLover76
prepaid customers actually buy more phones as they're not tied to just one phone and a contract or the cost to change the ESN. On the GSM side, it would be easy for a Metro customer go to their local Target or TMO store and buy a phone without doing much.
And with TMO "supporting" the iPhone5 more and more people will likley buy it now and use it on the new company. |
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 jimkPremium
join:2006-04-15
Raleigh, NC
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| reply to mob
said by mob:It will be exactly like Sprint/Nextel if the deal goes through.
No, it will probably be more similar to AT&T's acquisition of some Alltel service areas that Verizon wasn't allowed to keep. The Alltel network was converted from CDMA2000 to GSM/UMTS in these areas and you didn't hear anything about it because it went pretty smoothly.
The transition of MetroPCS customers to T-Mobile won't be quite as quick, but they have already set a date. The plan is to shut down MetroPCS's CDMA2000 network in 2015, and considering that full approval of the deal won't be completed until sometime next year, that isn't an insanely long transition time.
Both AT&T and Verizon have managed to acquire providers and integrate networks without it being a total disaster like Sprint and Nextel were. One carrier's poor execution of a merger doesn't mean the rest of the providers will have the same issue.
In addition to what appears to be a lack of planning, Nextel's iDEN network caused some complications since there wasn't a clear upgrade path to a more modern technology and it was very proprietary. Only Motorola made equipment for it, with the exception of a handful of BlackBerry devices. There were only a handful of iDEN/CDMA2000 phones and those didn't seem to sell very well, and had technical limitations. In contrast, there are already numerous phones that can run CDMA2000, GSM, UMTS, and LTE all in one device... so they can start selling phones that work on MetroPCS now, and they will continue to work on T-Mobile in the future. |
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| reply to hottboiinnc
hottboi we actually semi agree on something.. Also the fact that TMO is looking to put metro pcs customers on HSPA while deploying there own LTE so all those previous refurbished HSPA smart phone ( and feature phones) will be a easy sale to Metro customers for a price much less than purchasing a new TMO LTE enabled phone not to mention they can still label it a 4G phone as Metros LTE is just as fast as TMO HSPA. Heck TMO could/ might actually give Metro customers free refurbished comparable TMO HSPA phones (post and prepaid customers) to Metro customers who choose to stay to keep them happy. |
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tiger72SexaT duorPPremium
join:2001-03-28
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | reply to MovieLover76
said by MovieLover76:The only problem I think they'll have is that prepaid customers buy new phones much less frequently than postpaid, so getting all of the cdma users upgraded to HSPA+/LTE phones will take quite awhile. Prepaid doesn't offer phone subsidies so you can't even give away free phones to MetroPCS customers.
They will have to get inventive to upgrade those MetroPCS customers
According to MetroPCS, their customer phone churn is 60-65% per year. After 2-3 years, a vast majority of their customers would upgrade themselves to T-Mobile UMTS/LTE equipment. Let's not forget that customers themselves would have an incentive to upgrade to T-Mobile's *significantly* better performing network.
I don't think that the transition will be flawless - there are always speedbumps along the way. However they do seem to be quite aware of the flawed approaches of the past.
--
"What makes us omniscient? Have we a record of omniscience? ...If we can't persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we'd better reexamine our reasoning."
-United States Secretary of Defense (1961-1968) Robert S. McNamara |
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