Can Sprint re-capture market share and get firing on all cylinders again in order to stay up with the competition, continue to upgrade their networks, and redevelop their marketing plan? What about RIM, look what happened to them? How can Sprint compete against the big boys like AT&T, Verizon, etc.? Yes, all good questions, and there has sure been some fall-out in the market place with handset makers, mergers, and poor timing on partnering while Apple drove away with the show leaving a debris of nails on the highway behind them in the form of intellectual property and patent lawsuits. Okay, let's talk for just a wee bit.
The Washington Times had an interesting article on October, 11, 2012 titled; "Sprint, Japanese firm in talks over investment," by Peter Svensson which stated that; "Sprint Nextel Corporation said Japanese cellphone company Softbank Corporation is in talks about making a potential substantial investment in the US company. Sprint, the third-largest cellphone company in the US, said the deal could be big enough to involve a 'change of control' of the company."
Now then, let me tell you of my experience with the Nextel Small Business Communication Solutions have been mixed. First, our company did business in Overland Park, KS washing vehicles for corporate employees, and also enjoyed using their products in the San Fernando Valley in CA, Reno NV, Coachella Valley, Phoenix Area, and Nashville TN, but had issues with service (promises made-un-kept elsewhere). The other big boys in telecom did seem to get the frequency allocations (post FCC auction) needed to rapidly expand after the telecom crash recovery.
Sprint is (was) very good at grass roots marketing, chamber of commerce marketing, branding, but they are in a big game with players with 10s of billions busy expanding their networks. It's fierce. Just as T-Mobile and other have attempted mergers, and even if we look at the merging schematics of the industry in the last 10-years it's amazing even outpacing other industries where mergers are mega-common such as aerospace, healthcare, airliners, car rental agencies, etc.
Now then, regarding this new and latest announcement of a deal, well, I can tell you I'd rather see Sprint with a Japanese company than with let's say a Huawei Technologies, known for their sneaky strategies in spy-craft, not that the Echelon Project with AT&T was ever an innocent endeavor in that regard, but, the Japanese are a big player in both communication electronics and systems.
They need this too as they are having some tough challenges right now in nearly all sectors post-Earthquake-Tsunami, and look at autos with the Chinese-Japanese island disputes off Taiwan's coast and the nationalism in China at Japanese factories in country, or the car sales dealerships. Japan's major electronics firms have been hit by the game changing Apple, just as everyone has, they need steady venues. Sprint still has some juice left, no not like Usain Bolt, but they know how to Sprint in their marketing.
Indeed, over the years, I have had both good and bad to say about Sprint's solutions. I've been so frustrated I wanted to never use them again even prohibit our franchisees from using them - dis-approving them as official vendors, other times I recommended new franchisees with multiple units to use that service, as it was best of breed in the late 90s - to early 2000s in many regions of our country. Please consider all this and think on it.
Lance Winslow has launched a new provocative eBooks on Smart Phone Concepts. Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank; http://www.worldthinktank.net/
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