[M3Bahn]

To get the iPhone, Sprint agreed to rather onerous terms with Apple, Joann Lublin and Spencer Ante at the Wall Street Journal report.
Sprint agreed to buy 30.5 million iPhones over the next four years, regardless of whether or not it can sell the phones. At current rates, the WSJ says Sprint would be paying $20 billion for the handsets. (It's possible Apple introduces a cheaper phone in the next few years, thus lowering that number.)
A source familiar with the company to Lublin and Ante called it a "bet-the-company kind of thing." Without the iPhone, Sprint was getting whipped by Verizon and AT&T. With the iPhone it thinks it has a chance. But, to get the iPhone's price down to a competitive figure, will be subsidizing the iPhone by $500 per device sold.
Should be interesting to see how this one plays out.

http://www.businessinsider.com/sprin...ompany-2011-10

[Blake]

does sprint even have 30 million subs? i have an att iphone and would never thinking of switching to sprint due to excessively crappy service nearly everywhere. that'll be a hard sell, but i believe that's probably the only shot they have at remaining anywhere close to viable.

[Red Bread]

Is Sprint still CDMA or some form of non-GSM? Seems pretty worthless if you do any international travel, but I suppose the same can be said for Verizon and they manage to sell iPhones.

[NYCGP]

I have sprint... My friends send me texts and bbms instead of calling. I had to get a house phone due to such poor service in my apt. The unlimited plan is nice for businesses though.

[Blake]

Originally Posted by Red Bread

Is Sprint still CDMA or some form of non-GSM? Seems pretty worthless if you do any international travel, but I suppose the same can be said for Verizon and they manage to sell iPhones.

sprint is still CDMA and use WiMAX for their 4G. WiMAX is crap, and so is their CDMA coverage. i picked up a sprint phone with WiMAX when i was buying a house and living with the folks for a bit to use as a wifi connection. needless to say, it didn't work as advertised. service was generally crappy unless i was outside standing next to a cell tower. never again.

Originally Posted by NYCGP

I have sprint... My friends send me texts and bbms instead of calling. I had to get a house phone due to such poor service in my apt. The unlimited plan is nice for businesses though.

case closed. how good is that unlimited plan when you have to subsidize it with a home phone? i would rather pay extra for better service, even if not unlimited.

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by NYCGP

I have sprint... My friends send me texts and bbms instead of calling. I had to get a house phone due to such poor service in my apt. The unlimited plan is nice for businesses though.

Tmobile has uma wireless router calling which could be another solution for poor reception at home but I have been having horrible problems with their customer service lately.

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by Red Bread

Is Sprint still CDMA or some form of non-GSM? Seems pretty worthless if you do any international travel, but I suppose the same can be said for Verizon and they manage to sell iPhones.

They do have world phones like the photon, all you need is the GSM radio.

Motorola Photon 4G: Sprint’s Tegra 2-Powered, International Roaming Android Phone
http://gizmodo.com/5810367/motorola-...-android-phone

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by Blake

does sprint even have 30 million subs? i have an att iphone and would never thinking of switching to sprint due to excessively crappy service nearly everywhere. that'll be a hard sell, but i believe that's probably the only shot they have at remaining anywhere close to viable.

Actually latest consumer reports for what it's worth puts ATT dead last and sprint 2nd after verizon and above tmobile which I am thinking of bailing from and trying out sprint iphone.

[Blake]

Originally Posted by M3Bahn

Actually latest consumer reports for what it's worth puts ATT dead last and sprint 2nd after verizon and above tmobile which I am thinking of bailing from and trying out sprint iphone.

for what? signal reliability?

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by Blake

for what? signal reliability?

Best overall choice for most people, actually US Cellular came in first but they are not available in many areas.

Consumer Reports: AT&T is U.S.'s worst cell phone carrier
http://www.macworld.com/article/1562...r_reports.html

[Inspired]

Originally Posted by M3Bahn

Best overall choice for most people, actually US Cellular came in first but they are not available in many areas.

http://www.macworld.com/article/1562...r_reports.html

Not surprised. I live in the middle of San Francisco and I don't have any reception. ATT send me a 3G microcell so I can get reception using my internet connection

[Blake]

Originally Posted by M3Bahn

Best overall choice for most people, actually US Cellular came in first but they are not available in many areas.

http://www.macworld.com/article/1562...r_reports.html

to each their own, but i've never had a problem with my att service outside of stuff that all carriers experience, like temporary outages, etc. my bill is fair (i pay $70/mo for unlimited everything, although it's a corporate deal), i've never had a problem with service nearly anywhere including internationally, and it's GSM. they also recently just did a massive price cut on their international services rates, which is going to keep me as a att customer for a long time.

smaller wireless companies, like US cellular, metro PCS, and other low-cost carriers will always dominate customer satisfaction because they're fairly straightforward and affordable. these carriers aren't good for me due to lots of travel domestically and internationally.

[GOLFFRR]

I have had sprint for years (work phone) can't really say I have had any issues. I think it would be great to have another phone to the line up however I need the blackberry for the simple reason its a work horse. So even if the iPhone comes ill stick with my bold 9930

[Uber V8]

When peple complain about poor signal strength (not pointing any fingers) I am also inclined to ask if you have researched the coverage map for your area?

Each company has these maps displayed on their websites and allows you to make an informed decision in regards to signal strength. For example, VZW may cover more land, but just so happens to not cover your area, thus you thinking their service sucks ass. Just one aspect to consider.

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by GOLFFRR

I have had sprint for years (work phone) can't really say I have had any issues. I think it would be great to have another phone to the line up however I need the blackberry for the simple reason its a work horse. So even if the iPhone comes ill stick with my bold 9930

I've had it with my 9700, the 9900 series is very impressive but in my opinion it's almost two years late. I'm going iphone or samsung galaxy s2 depending on what gets announced tomorrow.

[Gregxi]

I would love to see the contract, this could be a brilliant move by apple and a perfect entry to the wireless market in a few years

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by FwdFtl

When peple complain about poor signal strength (not pointing any fingers) I am also inclined to ask if you have researched the coverage map for your area?

Each company has these maps displayed on their websites and allows you to make an informed decision in regards to signal strength. For example, VZW may cover more land, but just so happens to not cover your area, thus you thinking their service sucks ass. Just one aspect to consider.

So which carrier do you work for?


J/K

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by Gregxi

I would love to see the contract, this could be a brilliant move by apple and a perfect entry to the wireless market in a few years

You mean apple eventually buys out sprint?

[Gregxi]

Originally Posted by M3Bahn

You mean apple eventually buys out sprint?

It could be possible, I have no idea how many phones they can move but if I were apple I would have some strong language about what apple gets if sprint cannot live up to the contract. If they could get an established carrier to market the wares and shut everyone else out it could make them one step closer to world domination.

And what I mean by looking at the contract is getting someone much smarter than me to read it and the explain it to me in simple words that I can understand

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by Gregxi

It could be possible, I have no idea how many phones they can move but if I were apple I would have some strong language about what apple gets if sprint cannot live up to the contract. If they could get an established carrier to market the wares and shut everyone else out it could make them one step closer to world domination.

And what I mean by looking at the contract is getting someone much smarter than me to read it and the explain it to me in simple words that I can understand

There has been rumors about apple buying a carrier, I just saw this.


With Apple’s Sprint deal, did the maker just become the carrier?

There’s all sorts of news floating around today about Sprint agreeing to purchase a massive cache of iPhones over the next few years. It’s great news for Sprint, which has been having trouble keeping up in the iPhone-heavy world of AT&T and Verizon, and it could be great news for Apple, too. You see, if 2 and 2 really are adding up to make 4, Apple just bought itself a carrier, but not necessarily in the fashion you might think.

Now, let’s look at how this all works. You might remember a few weeks ago when TNW’s Matthew Panzarino posited that Apple should in fact buy a carrier with its spare cash. He investigated the idea of creating a data-only network, building its own or purchasing an existing one. In each of these instances, the problems were potentially huge, but nothing that $65 billion in cash couldn’t help to overcome.

But Sprint has another option – white label. Sprint Wholesale Solutions is something that nobody else in the US carrier industry is doing. It enables those with enough cash (Apple has this) to run their own carrier. Virgin Mobile, Boost, ESPN…these are all names that you’ve likely seen who have taken part in the idea, primarily on a pre-paid basis. But none of these names had the cash to leverage the service in the way that Apple could.

If we look at this from a timeline perspective, it also makes sense. It’s conventional wisdom that tomorrow’s iPhone announcement will not include an LTE model. That works well considering that LTE doesn’t exist on Sprint just yet — Sprint’s 4G is WiMax, in conjunction with ClearWire, but the carrier has said that it is moving to LTE in 2012. That 2012 date? It’s the likely timeframe for an Apple LTE iPhone, too.

Why else does it make sense? If tomorrow rolls around and we find out that a white-label deal did happen with Apple and Sprint, Sprint’s part in the news will get lost in the shuffle. So leaking the news today about agreeing to purchase $30 million in iPhones makes sure that the carrier still gets due attention.

There’s another part of this story that lines up, too. Sprint, at present, has an $8 billion market cap. If the white-label deal works out well for Apple, if the company finds out that it can in fact run its own carrier, then it can afford to purchase Sprint outright for cash. Mind you that Apple does about $6 billion in profit each quarter, so it wouldn’t take much to offset the purchase cost. Buy the carrier, keep it moving forward and Apple does what it has always wanted to do – eliminate the carrier middle-man. Only in this scenario, it does so by becoming the carrier itself.

It’s entirely possible that I’m completely off base here, but moving into the territory of controlling absolutely every aspect of your product is something that Apple has done for years. Buying a carrier? That’s just par for the course.

http://thenextweb.com/apple/2011/10/...e-the-carrier/

[Blake]

the original post ITT was a little confusing. i read a story on BGR earlier that lines up a bit with the last post, but more along the lines of sprint being the exclusive carrier of the iphone 5. the last post makes more sense. if sprint becomes something like apple wireless, they're going to have to do some incredibly crazy things to bolster sprint's network. if it does indeed shake down like that, i'm going to be incredibly furious because there isn't a chance in hell that i want to be on sprint's crappy CDMA network. i would rather scoop up an android LTE phone.

[yakev724]

Very interesting stuff, second big move after the T-Mobile/ATT "merger" which (imo) essentially prevented T-Mobile from signing a contract with Apple. ATT pays T-Mobile some cash and keeps a monopoly on GSM iPhone sales (aside from Apple now selling unlocked phones directly).

I'm very happy with T-Mobile. I'm happy with the monthly price, pretty happy with reception (especially where I live), and I'm happy that my iPhone works perfectly. There's no 3G support, but I can't justify paying for it anyway. 5 should resolve that anyway.

As to the above, I highly doubt Apple would risk making their (most popular?) product available under Sprint exclusively. They're not only at making money with a contract, they consider the investment, and imo Sprint's a pretty bad one.