Yep, Sprint is set, even after posting losses of subscribers. Sprint will be bigger? maybe if you add the subscribers from the two carriers combined. which is really a refelction for Softbank not Sprint. And across the world it would only be the 3rd largest still trailing Verizon and some other China Company.. as far as the United States it doesn't help their chances maybe they can roll out more of their network but still would be trailing Verizon and AT&T in coverage.
"On October 14, 2012, it was announced that the Japanese telecommunications company SoftBank will purchase 70% of Sprint Nextel Corporation for $20.1 billion.[1] SoftBank says Sprint will remain a separate entity and it will not switch Sprint from CDMA to GSM and will continue their plans to make Sprint an all-LTE carrier by 2017.[11] The deal is expected to be completed in the second quarter of 2013"
Well SoftBank/Sprint must have somebody nervous because it's kinda strange that all of a sudden one of the other Guys has reported that they plan on putting some money into their LTE and guess what dollar amount??? LOL.....Yep, $8 Billion......Why that number??? LOL
Yet Son hates the very idea of running third-best to anyone else. He explained the buy to CNBC's Jim Cramer like this: "I am a man, and every man wants to be No. 1, not No. 2 or No. 3."
For one, Son thinks that data networking is the most important feature of any mobile service. Softbank derives two-thirds of its revenue from data plans, which is about twice as much as American networks. Voice and texting plans simply don't matter much to him.
This is a fairly revolutionary idea in the American market, where data is seen as just another service to sell alongside equally important voice and text plans. If Son can mold Sprint in Softbank's image, we'll have a genuinely new option on the local market.
It's easy to shrug at claims like that, assuming that the guy is out of his mind. But Softbank was in fact the first Japanese network to sell Apple's iPhones, so the Jobs connection is no fairy tale. And Sprint may lag behind the dynamic duo at the top, but it does own a solid nationwide network with deep connections to another one from Clearwire. The company is in position to do something very interesting here, and Masayoshi Son might just be the right man for the job.
Finally, nobody ever became a self-made billionaire and owner of Japan's fastest-growing cell service by placing wild bets on imaginary opportunities. But whatever it is, I'm guessing we'll see rock-bottom pricing on a data-based service bundle that enables his top-secret sauce.
The American wireless market is about to get a well-deserved kick in the pants.