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April 24, 2013

Both SoftBank, Dish Remain Interested in Sprint Nextel

SoftBank and Dish Network still appear to be interested in acquiring Sprint Nextel – even after the company saw a loss in its customer base during the recent quarter.

It was also revealed that the company saw a lower loss during Q1 – than expected – of $643 million, Reuters reported. Overall, it lost 560,000 subscribers, including customers who left the Nextel network. This compares to Verizon Wireless adding 677,000 subscribers and AT&T adding 296,000 subscribers in the quarter.

T-Mobile USA, part of Deutsche Telekom, also posed a competitive risk in the sector. "The AT&T and Sprint results confirm that T-Mobile USA has been taking share in the last few months," Macquarie Analyst Kevin Smithen told Reuters.

Also, during Q1 Sprint saw its revenue increase to $8.79 billion from $8.73 billion. That amount topped analysts’ prediction of $8.71 billion.

Sprint is now considering a $25.5 billion unsolicited bid from Dish. Sprint planned to sell 70 percent of the company to SoftBank for $20.1 billion, which could close by July 1. A committee was set up at Sprint to review the bid from Dish.

Dish said in a recent statement that its offer “creates a company with an industry-leading spectrum portfolio and the only company that can offer customers a fully-integrated, nationwide bundle of in- and out-of-home video, broadband and voice services while unlocking the full potential of Sprint’s network vision.”

“Additionally, the combined national footprints and scale of DISH/Sprint will provide substantial benefits to the American public by bringing improved broadband services to millions of homes with inferior or no access to competitive broadband services,” the Dish statement added, according to a ZDNet report.

Moreover, Sprint has also made a bid for Clearwire. Clearwire shareholders will likely vote on May 21 to approve or reject Sprint's $2.2 billion offer to buy the remaining 49 percent of Clearwire it doesn't already own, MobilityTechzone reported.

"Sprint does have the option of still proceeding with that (Clearwire) transaction if the SoftBank merger doesn't complete. But we're not obligated to acquire Clearwire if the SoftBank/Sprint merger isn't completed," Sprint CEO Dan Hesse concluded..




Edited by Jamie Epstein


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