Talk about blowing smoke signals…
SoftBank main man Masayoshi Son – the company that now owns Sprint – spoke to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce yesterday in what most assuredly was meant to garner propaganda headlines aimed at the FCC. Not that the regulatory body overseeing a proposed merger of Sprint and T-Mobile doesn’t already have all the facts it needs to make a decision.
My guess is that was it was a play by Son to curry favor for an approval.
The new Sprint BMOC, (big man on campus), who describes himself as blunt and frequently yells at the execs inside his newest telephone play toy, says that if regulators let him take over T-Mobile that he will revolutionize the American cellphone market the way he did Japan’s, complete with price wars and faster bandwidth speeds.
So how fast is fast? Son wants to provide 1 gigabit per second, same as Google Fiber.
For you non techies who don’t know how fast 1 gigabit per second actually is, it’s so fast, Harley’s comments will show up practically as soon as he thinks them!
Son drew a bead on smaller rival T-Mobile soon as he had Sprint in his grasp.
Yes, they are smaller, but T-Mobile is still a significant player and the Commission is giving this deal extra scrutiny. And while Sprint has been lessening its churn – the term used for customers going out the back door faster than they come in the front – T-Mobile has continued to grow a loyal customer base with top notch customer service and a good solid signal.
T-Mobile is a great get for Son. Sprint spent millions opposing a 2011 T-Mobile take over by AT&T, and now is selling the story of why it makes perfect sense for Sprint to buy it.
And, it does.
Sprint has placed all its cards on the table trying to hard sell the FCC on what they call Verizon and AT&T’s “duopoly.” Sprint’s position being that those two firms, when combined, are too big and have already kept competition out.
Adding T-Mobile to the Sprint family will level the playing field.
Son’s hopes that message, complete with promises of a price war, is exactly what regulators want to hear. And that it will push the Commission over the edge to approve the merger with Sprint, which I think it will.
Not because of the message, but because it makes perfect sense.
You’re going to see this deal get approval.
And, with these two firms combined, Son will be able to stand behind his price and speed commitment, a win-win for the general public.
Antitrust rabble rousers remain opposed to this merger just as they were the AT&T proposal, but I’m betting this ends up looking like it makes much more sense in the marketplace.
Son said he declared a price war in Japan and as a result, “The cost for each subscriber has gone down. Japan uses 50 percent more data than the United States, but American consumers pay 1.7 times more than Japanese consumers.”
I say let the Son shine on the T-Mobile/Sprint merger. What’s not to like about it?
Plus, it makes me giggle every time I read about Son yelling at the Sprint execs. He’s got my vote on that count alone!
Oh good sweet lord NO!!
That means we will have to drop T-Mobile if Sprint buys them out.
Oh good sweet lord NO!!
That means we will have to drop T-Mobile if Sprint buys them out.
Oh good sweet lord NO!!
That means we will have to drop T-Mobile if Sprint buys them out.
Third time is the charm, I guess.
You can delete the other two, intarwebs program was gettin’ restless.
It appears Dude was extremely serious about his comment!
“Antitrust rebel rousers”
Did you mean “rabble-rousers” or are you talking about some newly discovered reason for the Civil War? And while I like the idea of a Sprint/T-Mobile merger in theory the fact that Sprint is involved makes me hate it. I’ve never had an issue with T-Mobile and had nothing but bad experiences with Sprint.
go wislon…where ya been….???????????????????????
down in the everglades….okeefanokee swamp?????????????????
missed your highly touted and well defined articles that …..went
nowhere!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
okay….as long assprint has some semblance of presence in
kc I’m fine with whatever they do..
I’m going with wal mart $50 everything…
tired of the crap from the other phone companies…
when all is said and done wal mart (and whoever they work with)
will own it all anyway.
thanks for theink…you’re right…I think very fast….1000 giggaguggles
a minute…..wish I could type that fast.
anyway…have fun at the zoo and don’t get too trashed on st. pats day.
Harley, your intellect is dizzying and I’d guess you are WalMarts target demographic! Thanks for being my biggest fan, des3iple and reader.
I read everything you write…better than john stewart and
tonight show for comedy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!hahahahahaha
oh yeah…and after son drops some yens around to the corrupt pols
in dc….it will all get approved….
or he can go to Christie and his mob outfit dtto getit done……
Don’t understand the commotion; never owned a smartphone nor have any (perverted) desire in that direction. Carried a normal work cell phone for over a decade and found that beyond annoying – was glad to be rid of it.
Generally speaking, no one needs a cell/smart phone any more than they need a home pc/laptop. The market is almost wholly ego driven.
Nick, I get that in a uni bomber world, and trust me, most of the time Id rather live there…..but I couldn’t do what I do for my primary vocation or writing for this eRag without both! It’s a vicious circle, but if I had the ability to do without my cell phone, I most certainly would.
Nobody really needs a smartphone. Because you should already have a tablet, laptop and possibly a tower too. It is really only the dumb, bottom 20% of the segment that uses them instead of computers.
I see what you did there, Balbo, but it’s actually the bottom 74%;
A new study from research firm Frank N. Magid Associates, seen by eMarketer, found that the number of mobile phone users in the U.S. who owned or used a smartphone this year reached 74 percent, up from 58 percent last year, as smartphones continue to push feature phones out of the market. Tablet ownership saw an even larger increase, leaping from 33 percent of mobile phone users in 2012 to 52 percent this year.
I’m willing to bet a significant portion of that 74% probably uses it as their sole form of communication with the internet. Trust me, there are many people like that out there. Hell, I typed this on a 1993 nokia
Hahahaha, you’re funny. I would be willing to bet your close to right if you qualified it as “main” not “sole” source. I know I’m rarely in my office; my day is spent going to client locations. My lap top is in my backpack, but 99% of the time, I’m checking personal and company email off my iPhone. Its just easier to text, read and respond to email while driving that way. Otherwise, I’ve got my lap top on the dash and the screen blocks part of my vision! Add to that, the dash on the Mercedes has a hump in it, so its hard to type and keep it level! See my pain?
OK, I’m kidding, I don’t email/text and drive! Its not safe. I did see a lady doing it last week, weaving all over two lanes. It made me so mad I pulled up beside her and threw my beer at her!!
Hahahaha, you’re funny. I would be willing to bet your close to right if you qualified it as “main” not “sole” source. I know I’m rarely in my office; my day is spent going to client locations. My lap top is in my backpack, but 99% of the time, I’m checking personal and company email off my iPhone. Its just easier to text, read and respond to email while driving that way. Otherwise, I’ve got my lap top on the dash and the screen blocks part of my vision! Add to that, the dash on the Mercedes has a hump in it, so its hard to type and keep it level! See my pain?
OK, I’m kidding, I don’t email/text and drive! Its not safe. I did see a lady doing it last week, weaving all over two lanes. It made me so mad I pulled up beside her and threw my beer at her!!
I guess Wilson was extremely serious about it too.
hey that was hearnes wife you threw that beer on wislon!
No, it was Hearne’s wife I had dinner with last weekend!
This is never going to be approved, and the FCC and DOJ have said as much. This media blitz is an attempt to get people fired up and to get them to support the idea of this merger. But regulators in DC aren’t elected officials, and they have a record of squashing similar mergers, which the White House supports. People aren’t going to start calling their congressional representatives and demanding that this merger happens.
This Son dude is a colorful guy, though, well-known for having shouting matches with his Japanese competitors and for saying (on the record) that he was “willing to die” over obtaining some spectrum that another company ultimately got. That’s not quite how spectrum buying/licensing works in the US, however. He’s gotten rid of some higher-ups at Sprint already, and he’s unhappy with their advertising and hasn’t been quiet about it. I suspect that he’s going to move Sprint HQ to California. Whatever, it’s his right to act like a nut and to operate his company from wherever and with whatever staff he wants.
But regardless, fewer competitors doesn’t increase competition and will instead result in higher prices and maybe even less innovation. Not to mention that many people would lose jobs as a result of the merger. He promised a price war, but T-Mobile is already bringing that, without Sprint’s help: Despite the numerous limitations on their network infrastructure, coverage, and speeds, T-Mobile has managed to get the big guys to lower prices in order to compete with the little telecom that could (well, maybe–again, their service and coverage isn’t great). But if they can do that, why can’t Sprint make a price war all their own? Sprint is now well-funded by a Japanese company; T-Mobile is well-funded by a German company, and they just want special treatment and concessions from our government, so they’ll say whatever they think will get that done. But they’re wrong.
Furthermore, Sprint and T-Mobile networks and spectrum holdings aren’t compatible, so technically speaking, merging the two would be a disaster not unlike the Sprint/Nextel debacle. The FCC is well aware of these facts.
But that Comcast/Time Warner merger? Yeah, that’s probably gonna happen.