Sunday, June 19, 2011

What Will LightSquared Deal with Sprint Mean?

LightSquared reportedly has reached a 15-year deal with Sprint Nextel Corp. to share network expansion costs and equipment for the planned wholesale LightSquared Long Term Evolution network.

The deal, valued at as much as $20 billion over the length of the contract, would provide revenue for Sprint, a faster buildout for the LightSquared national LTE network, and also makes Sprint a wholesale customer of LightSquared as well. Early reports had suggested that Sprint would receive both cash and capacity on the LTE network as part of the deal. Read more here.

Beyond the important tactical considerations (revenue for Sprint, faster buildout at lower cost for LightSquared), there are potential strategic angles as well. The deal immediately confirms that Sprint will migrate at least some of its services to the LTE air interface.



But that also raises more questions about the fate of its Clearwire investment and strategy. See Report: Sprint consummates LTE network-sharing deal with LightSquared - FierceWireless.


There is some growing speculation that Clearwire is getting ready to sell itself in any case. So what might that mean? Would Sprint abandon Clearwire and work with LightSquared instead? Would Sprint acquire the remainder of Clearwire it does not already own?


And would any such moves signal that Sprint, facing formidably large competitors in an AT&T fortified with T-Mobile USA's assets, plus Verizon Wireless, again try to create a bigger presence in the wholesale LTE market?


>Both Clearwire and LightSquared have formal wholesale business plans, while Sprint arguably has been the most willing of the national mobile carriers to explore wholesale business models. There are some indications Clearwire intends to sell itself. Sprint already owns 54 percent of Clearwire. Would Sprint acquire the remainder of the firm?


Or is there some way for Sprint to leverage both Clearwire and LightSquared in some way to create a pre-eminent LTE or 4G wholesale role in the market? In the past, Sprint has been willing to forge multiple partnerships with cable operators, for example, embracing wholesale in a way that neither AT&T nor Verizon Wireless have preferred.


Might Sprint once again try to become the carrier of choice for "all the rest of us" in the competitive space? If the AT&T acquisition of T-Mobile USA is approved, Sprint will have to do something more dramatic. Riskier moves, or innovative moves, are what underdogs typically can be expected to try, in just about any market.

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