Items tagged with Sprint
Sprint and T-Mobile have been trying to merge on and off for years. The latest effort kicked off in 2019 and some states have been fighting against the merger in court. Today, U.S. District court Judge Victor Marrero ruled in favor of allowing Sprint and T-Mobile to merge despite objections by state attorneys general from California, Connecticut, D.C., Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin. Opponents of the merger -- which was initially approved by the Department of Justice in July 2019 -- argued that the merger would lead to higher prices, particularly for those who use prepaid...
Read more...
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...
Read more...
T-Mobile has announced it will launch its nationwide 5G network, which it will use to "do good" around the country. The big announcement is that T-Mobile will light up its 5G nationwide network on December 6, laying the foundation for the massive network that will have the capacity to deliver what it calls "breakthrough connectivity" to millions. That last bit relies on the closing of its merger with Sprint as planned in 2020. T-Mobile says that the combined T-Mobile and Sprint will be a "supercharged Un-carrier" that is bigger and better with plans to use 5G for good. The merged Sprint and T-Mobile is being called the New T-Mobile, and it is outlining three new initiatives focused on using 5G...
Read more...
AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon have all teamed up on a new cross-platform messaging initiative called the Cross-Carrier Messaging Initiative (CCMI). CCMI is a next-gen messaging service that will be available to consumers and businesses. It's based on GSMA's Rich Communications Service (RCS) industry standard and will allow an "engaging" way for people to interact with businesses and each other. The wireless carriers note the CCMI joint venture is working to develop and deploy the standards-based, interoperable messaging service starting with Android. The service is expected to deploy with Android devices in 2020, and CCMI promises to: Drive a robust business-to-consumer messaging ecosystem...
Read more...
Sprint has announced that it has turned on its 5G network in three new markets. The new markets include New York City, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Washington, D.C. Those cities are now live in addition to the previously launched cities including Kansas City, Atlanta, Houston, and Dallas-Fort Worth. Sprint says that its "true 5G" network in the new cities is running Nokia 64T64R 5G Massive MIMO radios. Those radios have a split mode that allows Sprint to offer LTE Advanced and 5G New Radio (NR) service on the 2.5GHz mid-band spectrum. Those radios are being deployed on the existing 4G cell sites to provide a nearly identical footprint for the 2.5GHz LTE and 5G NR coverage. As the Sprint 5G network...
Read more...
Report Shows Wireless Carriers Are Cheaping Out And Throttling Your Video Streams Whenever They Want
We all know that wireless carriers throttle data. After all, throttling has been commonplace ever since carriers moved from their "buckets" of data in 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB sizes, for example. Once carriers started fully embracing unlimited data, they started implementing policies where they would throttle data once customers reached a certain threshold (usually around 20GB) if cell towers are overloaded. But now new research shows that carriers are throttling video streams even when customers have not reached the carrier-set threshold or when "data congestion" isn’t a serious problem on the network. This information comes from Northeastern University and the University of Massachusetts Amhert,...
Read more...
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...
Read more...
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...
Read more...
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...
Read more...
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....
Read more...
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...
Read more...
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...
Read more...
Federal regulators are big on keeping healthy competition in the wireless marketplace and have in the past blocked mergers of major wireless carriers from happening. Last April, T-Mobile and Sprint announced that they intended to merge with T-Mobile CEO John Legere leading the combined companies. The two carriers claim that when combined they would be better able to compete against Verizon and AT&T and accelerate the rollout of 5G. The two companies have attempted twice in the past two join forces. A third attempt likely surprised some considering the previous deals were never successful. Reports claim that even if the Justice Department approves the merger this time around, states...
Read more...
AT&T is already embroiled in lawsuits over its “5G Evolution” service, or 5G E, which the company claims enables speeds up to 2x faster than traditional 4G LTE on compatible devices. Competitors, however, have taken AT&T to task over this claim, and allege that 5G E is nothing more than a misleading marketing tactic designed to deceive consumers and gain a leg-up as true, next-generation 5G networks begin rolling out. A study that was just released by Opensignal seems to jibe with what AT&T's competitors have to say. AT&T’s 5G Evolution service is enabled by a handful of key upgrades to the company’s existing 4G LTE network: carrier aggregation, 4x4...
Read more...
