Items tagged with (NYSE:S)
After a few false starts over the years, T-Mobile has finally completed its merger with Sprint. Sprint was the fourth place U.S. wireless carrier, with T-Mobile sitting in the third-place position. As a combined company -- which will simply be called T-Mobile -- it will remain in third place behind Verizon Wireless and AT&T in total subscriber numbers. With the announcement that the merger has been completed, enthusiastic (and often times foul-mouthed) CEO John Legere is stepping down. This executive change was first announced last year, so we knew it was coming. What was unexpected, however, was that the transition would happen a month early. It was previously stated that...
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Most people have been there at some point; you accidentally drop your smartphone, and the screen shatters. In years past, sometimes that meant it was time to upgrade to a new smartphone and toss the cracked phone in a drawer. With the price of smartphones soaring today, most people opt to fix their devices. Sprint has a deal going on screen repair right now specifically for Samsung Galaxy devices. Sprint will fix the screen on a Samsung Galaxy smartphone for just $49 -- regardless of which carrier you use. That is much cheaper than a regular screen repair costs, often at $100 or more. The fine print says that Sprint will only repair screens at stores with service and repair centers, and that...
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Sprint is going all-in with 5G wireless connectivity, and has announced that it will make available a fourth 5G-compatible device for its network. The fourth-place wireless carrier – which will soon merge with third-place T-Mobile – already sells the Samsung Galaxy S10 5G, LG V50 ThinQ and the HTC 5G Hub. The fourth device will be an unnamed smartphone from OnePlus. The most obvious device that Sprint could introduce is the already announced OnePlus 7 Pro 5G. The OnePlus 7 Pro 5G looks largely identical to its OnePlus 7 Pro counterpart, including its Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 SoC, 6.67-inch 90Hz display, 4000 mAh battery and 256GB of internal storage. The primary...
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Hot on the heels of news earlier this week that the U.S. Department of Justice was on the verge of approving the merger of T-Mobile and Sprint, the news was confirmed this morning. The merger is valued at $26 billion, and will create a strengthened third-place wireless carrier to better compete with #1 Verizon and #2 AT&T. However, there are number of concessions that had to be made for the merger to obtain the DOJ's blessing. For starters, Sprint is divesting its prepaid business including Boost Mobile and Virgin Mobile to Dish Network, which is creating its own wireless service. Dish Network will also gain 800MHz spectrum totaling $5 billion from T-Mobile and Sprint along with...
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Sprint and T-Mobile announced that they intended to merge with T-Mobile CEO John Legere leading the newly merged company last year. Today, a report is going around that the U.S. Department of Justice plans to approve the $26 billion merger between the two cellular carriers on Thursday. However, the deal will have some conditions attached to it. The big condition is that certain wireless assets must be sold to Dish. CNBC cites sources close to the matter as saying that the DOJ is requiring T-Mobile to sell its pre-paid mobile division to Dish with the satellite TV provider paying $1.4 billion in return. Dish will also pay $3.6 billion over time for spectrum assets. The sources claim that the merged...
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If you're trying to access the incredibly popular microblogging website Twitter, you've probably noticed that it's inaccessible at the moment. When visiting the site at the moment, you'll be greeted with the following message: Something is technically wrong. Thanks for noticing—we're going to fix it up and have things back to normal soon. Twitter is the place that internet users normally flock to share news of a popular site going down, but that doesn't exactly apply in this case. So, the next best thing is to hit up DownDetector, which showed a huge spike in reports from users right about 3pm EST. There are currently over 32,000 reports of Twitter being down as logged by DownDetector....
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Amazon as a wireless carrier? It seems like an outrageous idea, but it's a move that could be in the cards according to a new report. T-Mobile and Sprint -- the third- and fourth-place U.S. wireless carriers respectively -- are looking to complete a merger that has seen some pushback from the U.S. Government. As part of the merger agreement, T-Mobile and Sprint have agreed to offload Sprint's Boost prepaid brand; a divestiture that could bring in as much as $3 billion. Boost currently has between 7 to 8 million customers according to recent estimates. According to Reuters, Amazon reportedly wants in on the action and is looking to purchase Boost to grow its empire....
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AT&T and Verizon may have been the first to activate their 5G wireless networks in the United States, but Sprint is looking to have the broadest coverage (to date) available to the largest number of Americans with its initial rollout. Sprint is launching its 5G service in the following major metropolitan areas: Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and Kanas City. Unlike AT&T and Verizon, which have embraced millimeter wave (mmWave) spectrum from their 5G rollouts, Sprint is using Ericsson-provided 64T64R (64 transmitters 64 receivers) 5G Massive MIMO radios that support split-mode. Split-mode allows the wireless carrier to deliver both 4G LTE and 5G NR service at the same time, all from...
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Sprint and T-Mobile announced a little over a year ago that they would be merging into one company. However, the United States Department of Justice has a few things to say about this union before the companies can ride off into the sunset. The Department of Justice has reportedly told Sprint and T-Mobile that the government will not allow the deal to be completed as it currently stands. Last spring, Sprint and T-Mobile announced that they would merge together to provide the best 5G network possible. Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure noted, “Going from 4G to 5G is like going from black and white to color TV...It’s a seismic shift-- one that only the combined company can unlock nationwide...
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When it comes to AT&T's fake 5G network -- as it calls it, 5G Evolution (5G E) -- there seems to be universal backlash against the company's marketing and the confusion that it sows with Fourth place wireless carrier Sprint has already filed a lawsuit against second-place AT&T for these deceptive practices, and now it is once again calling out the company in an open letter [PDF]. Sprint even uses AT&T own words against, as the wireless carrier acknowledged that it was trying to craft its own 5G narrative. "Every company is guilty of building a narrative of how you want the world to work. And I love the fact that we broke our industry's narrative two days ago, and they're...
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MWC 2019 will be here before you know it and at the show, there will be a legion of new smartphones unveiled. Among the devices to be revealed is the LG V50 ThinQ. LG has already been teasing the device, so we know a bit about it, and now an image has leaked that claims to be of the smartphone wearing its Sprint 5G livery. A glance at the device shows that it looks very familiar. Image via Evan Blass Essentially the LG V50 ThinQ looks exactly like the V40 ThinQ that came before it, but the V50 has a yellow 5G logo on the back for Sprint duty. The back of the alleged V50 ThinQ shows the same three camera arrangement with fingerprint scanner underneath. The image of the front of the V50 has the...
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The war of words between America's top carriers over 5G branding has now devolved into a lawsuit. AT&T started this whole mess then it decided to relabel its LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) network as 5G Evolution (5G E). Competing carriers cried foul as 5G E is little more than extension of 4G LTE technology and is in no way true 5G. Sprint, the fourth-place wireless carrier, has now filed a lawsuit against AT&T for its blatantly misleading advertising. "AT&T has sought to gain an unfair advantage in the race to 5G by embarking on a nationwide advertising campaign to deceive consumers into believing that its existing 4G LTE Advanced network is now a 5G network," says Sprint in...
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Every major wireless company likes to thump its chest and proclaim it is home to the best network, in terms of speed and coverage, but is there a clear winner? According to the latest USA Mobile Network Experience Report by OpenSignal, Verizon leads the way more often than not, though the results are a bit more surprising when you dig into the individual tests. OpenSignal tested wireless performance in five different categories—4G Availability, Video Experience, Download Speed Experience, Upload Speed Experience, and Latency Experience. Verizon won three of the five categories, those being 4G availability, videos, and uploads. Click to Enlarge (Source: OpenSignal) What's interesting, though,...
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We’ve already heard straight from Samsung that the Galaxy S10 will not be its first 5G smartphone when it launches early next year. Motorola, on the other hand, will bring 5G functionality to the Moto Z3 courtesy of the 5G Moto Mod in early 2019. Is anyone else willing to step up to the 5G plate when it comes to smartphone? According to a joint press release issued today, LG will be delivering its first 5G smartphone in 2019 with the help of Sprint. The unnamed smartphone will land during the first half of 2019, and it's claimed that it will be the first 5G smartphone available in the United States. We don't know if Sprint will be able to make this claim by actually...
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It seems as though wireless carriers are finding new ways to squeeze out profits and in turn hit customers with further restrictions on their cellular plans. We can credit T-Mobile with causing a resurgence in unlimited data plans, but the term "unlimited" has been butchered recently. The latest carrier to muddy the unlimited data waters is Sprint. The company has announced two new unlimited data plans: Unlimited Plus and Unlimited Basic priced at $70 and $60 per month respectively. Unlimited Plus gives customers unlimited data, talk and text along with 15GB of LTE hotspot. In addition, Unlimited Plus allows you to stream in Full HD and includes free subscriptions to Hulu and TIDAL....
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When it comes to the biggest wireless networks in the United States, we have four major players (ranked by size): Verizon Wireless, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint. While all four wireless carriers offer "nationwide" coverage, the quality and speed of that service really depends on where you live. For those that are looking to choose a wireless carrier -- either after moving to a new part of the country, or if you're just simply looking to make a switch to take advantage of some hot promotions -- PC Magazine has conducted an extensive number of speed tests featuring the four major wireless carriers across 30 of the largest population centers in America. In the 2018 edition of the...
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Even though Sprint is currently in the process of acquired by T-Mobile, that isn't stopping the company from trying another ploy to steal customers from its larger rivals. The company's latest offer is a $15/month unlimited data plan that is quite restrictive, as you might expect with the bargain basement pricing. $15/month gets you unlimited calling, texting and data. However, Sprint admits that video streaming will be limited to DVD quality (480p), music streaming is limited to 500 Kbps, and game streams will be capped at 2 Mbps. You will also be subject to "data deprioritization" during periods where Sprint's cell towers are congested. To qualify for the offer, you have to switch from...
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Sprint is offering a deal that folks who are interested in one of the new slick little Qualcomm Snapdragon Always Connected PC Platform devices will really love. The deal allows eligible devices to get free unlimited LTE data for the entirety of 2018. There are three devices that are eligible for the free data offer, including the ASUS NovaGo, HP Envy X2, and the Lenovo Miix 630. All three of those devices are on the aforementioned Snapdragon 835 Mobile PC Platform and employ a Qualcomm X16LTE modem. The 2-in1 machines look very similar to the Microsoft Surface Pro with ultra-portable detachable or convertible designs, some with keyboard covers. The fine print on the deal notes that the free...
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It looks though the third time was a charm for T-Mobile and Sprint. After two previous attempts at tying the knot, T-Mobile and Sprint today officially announced that they have agreed to merge in an effort to create a powerhouse wireless company delivering 5G internet the masses. The move is no doubt an attempt to better compete with Verizon Wireless and AT&T, America's first- and second-place wireless carriers respectively. T-Mobile is currently a distant third place when it comes to wireless subscribers, while Sprint sits in fourth place. The combined company will be called T-Mobile, and it will be led by the T-Mobile's current executive team to spread more Un-carrier goodness....
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For what feels like the millionth time, T-Mobile and Sprint are reportedly once again in talks about a possible merger, and this time it sounds like they're actually making progress. It's said the two wireless carriers might even come to terms on a deal as early as next week, though we have learned that it when comes to these two companies, merger talks can fall apart at any moment, as they've done in the past. Nevertheless, negotiations are ongoing. Should T-Mobile and Sprint ultimately decide to join forces, they would create a wireless juggernaut with 127 million customers. That would still put the company behind Verizon and AT&T, which have an estimated 150 million and 141 million customers,...
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Will they, or won't they? T-Mobile and Sprint have tried on two previous occasions to tie the knot in an effort to create a powerhouse wireless carrier to better compete with Verizon and AT&T. However, those two previous deals both crashed and burned leaving T-Mobile and Sprint to fend for themselves. Now, both CNBC and the Wall Street Journal are confirming that T-Mobile and Sprint have restarted merger talks. It is not known who was the initiating party this time around, but Sprint is seemingly in dire straight these days as its bleeds customers and attempts to raise capital to build out its nationwide wireless network. T-Mobile CEO John Legere (L), Sprint...
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As the fourth-place wireless carrier in the United States, Sprint is in need of a new strategy or ploy to stem its subscriber loss and become more competitive with the larger players in the market. To help on this front, Sprint has announced a new partnership with Hulu that will benefit users of its Unlimited Freedom wireless plans. These customers will now be given free access to Hulu’s Limited Commercials plan starting November 17th. For those keeping score, this basic Hulu plan usually costs $7.99 per month and only allows for one stream at a time. However, you do get full access to Hulu's expansive streaming library, including Hulu Originals like The Handmaid's Tale. “We know people love...
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