BillRoland
Premium
join:2001-01-21
Ocala, FL
clubs:
 ·Cox HSI
| Reality is setting in
Sprint is a company that is in trouble. They have entirely too many irons in the fire and they don't really know what to do with any of them. They still don't have a clue how to run the iDEN network nor how to deal with the iDEN customer base. They continue to expend tons of resources on deploying EVDO (which makes little sense to me if you tell everyone you're going to be building out a WiMAX network next year that is going to obsolete your EVDO network), there is still no clear marketing message, and on and on. Investors are right to be worried, this is a company that has only proved one thing: it cannot execute on anything. I know I'll get bashed by the Sprint faithful, but please understand I'm just telling you the facts of life. I have been saying for quite a while now that Sprint WiMAX wasn't going to materialize, or, at least not as it was being presented, so I'm not surprised to see these headlines starting to show up.
When you're only highlight in quarterly results is that your prepaid unit is growing like gangbusters, you've got a problem.
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"Don't steal. The government hates competition." |
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CMoore2004
Premium
join:2003-02-06
Jonesville, MI | The EVDO will likely still be the high-speed technology in phones. I'm not expecting to see my phone with WiMax capabilities. |
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Gilitar
join:2000-11-20
Mobile, AL | reply to BillRoland
You are exactly right. Watch for Sprint to be gobbled up by Time Warner or Comcast when the stock goes low enough. |
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Time4aNAP
Premium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL
| reply to BillRoland
said by BillRoland  :They (Sprint) still don't have a clue how to run the iDEN network nor how to deal with the iDEN customer base. Hey. I'll give Nextel props for finding an innovative way to repurpose land mobile frequencies in order to compete with the fledgling AMPS cellular industry. That was a bold move. But let's face reality. Times have changed.
IDEN is a last-ditch effort by Motorola to maintain Nextel as a cash cow. The technology is proprietary, non-interoperable and neither fish nor fowl. It combines all of the worst liabilities of non-cellular mobile telephony, TDMA and GSM, while offering absolutely no benefit whatsoever from either. (What good is a CIM when you must purchase your phone from a single vendor?) It should go away, and give those frequencies back to the land mobile market that needs them badly.
They continue to expend tons of resources on deploying EVDO (which makes little sense to me if you tell everyone you're going to be building out a WiMAX network next year that is going to obsolete your EVDO network) Hold on there, chief. EV-DO has only recently begun to cover major metropolitan areas. Suburban and rural customers are still stuck with 1xRTT. Do you really think that WiMAX is going to just magically appear overnight, all debugged and ready for service? If so, you've been snorting too much WiMAX pixie dust.
The fact of the matter is that EV-DO will still play a very important role in Sprint's mobile data services during the decade or so that it will realistically take to build out a WiMAX infrastructure. Let's not forget that, unlike EV-DO, WiMAX has yet to prove itself in the real world.
Investors are right to be worried, this is a company that has only proved one thing: it cannot execute on anything. I know I'll get bashed by the Sprint faithful, but please understand I'm just telling you the facts of life. One of those facts of life that you have so conveniently glossed over is that it's the investors who control every publicly-held company. Maybe if Sprint's shareholders stopped pretending that they're venture capitalists (yes, I noticed the spin--"investors"), and let the professionals do what they're supposed to do, there would be no cause for concern. As it stands, their only cause for worry is the spoiled fruits of their own meddling.
I have been saying for quite a while now that Sprint WiMAX wasn't going to materialize, or, at least not as it was being presented, so I'm not surprised to see these headlines starting to show up. That's a self-fulfilling prophecy. And it's precisely that kind of defeatist mindset perpetrated by clueless shareholders that has put Sprint in jeopardy. What I can't figure out is why so-called "investors" are so determined to lose their investments. I guess this is one case where ego has overpowered greed. |
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Time4aNAP
Premium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL
| reply to CMoore2004
said by CMoore2004 :The EVDO will likely still be the high-speed technology in phones. I'm not expecting to see my phone with WiMax capabilities. Why not? The whole point of WiMAX is mobility. That's the one and only selling point for WiMAX over existing point to point radio standards. Wouldn't it be foolish to squander that? |
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pepe675935
@northwestern.edu
| Not exactly. WiMax will be mostly used on the back end initially, especially in areas where you need big data pipes for extra capacity. There's more money in that right away. Later on I could see it being competitive with other wireless technologies. It won't be profitable in less densely populated areas either, unfortunately. That's where the shareholders need to take heed- they are correct in hesitating to support another technology that would marginalize the EVDO user base. |
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Michieru2
zzz zzz zzz
Premium
join:2005-01-28
Miami, FL
| reply to BillRoland
More or less we all know Sprint has always done things half-assed.
Investors should be worried but more or less I would like some actual world tests of WiMAX in action to see if it even makes sense in the first place to deploy such a technology.
Sprint more or less jumped in the middle of the ring and punched everyone in the face and now is about to receiving a punch back from everyone else.
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Duct tape, saving lives since 1942. |
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CMoore2004
Premium
join:2003-02-06
Jonesville, MI
| How do you figure? What's half-assed about the EVDO deployment? I've seen many people switch from satellite and dial-up to paying $60/month for EVDO and using a few dollars of actual bandwidth. Using WiMax for the backend and EVDO to the end-user could make for higher speeds and lower costs.
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Sprint Mobile Broadband PX-500 | Windows XP MCE SP2 | Mobile AMD Athlon 64 4000+ | 1.5GB RAM | ATI Mobile Radeon X600 128MB | 120GB HDD |
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Michieru2
zzz zzz zzz
Premium
join:2005-01-28
Miami, FL
| EV_DO is only a short term goal due too it's limitations of 3.1mbps. I have yet to see any video or some sort of specs of someone actually testing WiMAX in a real world test. It pisses me off that nobody has been able to provide it or help me god and give me the link already to the data.
Also half-assed as Sprint can never complete anything towards how they originally set it out to be. Although most people might think that this huge deployment is working, there are still large area's that are not covered.
What I am more interested is seeing a replacement for the CDMA network Sprint currently has, if they can also place calls efficiently on WiMAX, and at longer distances would it not make sense to create WiMAX phones and on top of that with high speed access?
I am sorry but I think CDMA is a legacy network and that we should be looking for alternatives especially which are not from Qualcomm. The wireless industry can improve so much but it might require to dump a entire network to do so.
So if Sprint plans to build a nationwide WiMAX network and specs truly show some promising numbers with real world tests, the legacy network can be used for other means.
After all WiMAX according to specs provide much greater coverage area and speed. Since calls will be going over IP one could also expect prices to drop like a rock compared to the technology we are currently on.
But it all depends on the real world tests WiMAX provides.
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Duct tape, saving lives since 1942. |
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Time4aNAP
Premium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL
| reply to pepe675935
said by pepe675935 :
Not exactly. WiMax will be mostly used on the back end initially, especially in areas where you need big data pipes for extra capacity. Back end as in backhaul? Call me dense, but how can WiMAX do that cost-effectively when there's so much unused fiber already in-place? Their claimed data rates, which tend to be over-optimistic, of less than 100 Mbps don't say "fat pipe" to me at all. Not when existing, mass-produced point to point radios deliver 100 Mbps inexpensively, and 10 GigE is readily available in configurations from 50 feet to 50 miles. What am I missing here?
Later on I could see it being competitive with other wireless technologies. You'd better tell that to the WiMAX trade groups, because they're already marketing their product as direct competition to 3G wireless. Time will tell, I guess.
I know that I'm not planning on giving up my EV-DO card unless and until Sprint terminates my service. Given their track record of keeping "discontinued" services living on long after their official deaths, but only if you're already signed up, that seems prudent.
It won't be profitable in less densely populated areas either, unfortunately. That's where the shareholders need to take heed- they are correct in hesitating to support another technology that would marginalize the EVDO user base. IME Sprint has taken its own sweet time in rolling out EV-DO. But I've always been able to establish a 1xRTT data link wherever I can get a signal, which is ubiquitous in the most remote areas that I've driven through. I liken it to the ISDN service that I had before DSL became readily available. Sure beats the 19.2 kbps that my old StarTAC phone gave me!
If Sprint can maintain a bare-minimum 1xRTT at every cell site, and fill in the gaps in EV-DO service over the next year to cover entire metropolitan areas, I'll be happy. If they manage to make that EV-DO Rev. A, I'll be thrilled. If they manage to get WiMAX service all the way out to where I live, and it's usable without requiring an external fixed antenna, AND the data rates with that configuration beat their EV-DO offering, I'll try it out.
However I'm not holding my breath on the last one. It seems that too many of Sprint's voting shares are held by people who like to sell short, if you know what I mean. |
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Time4aNAP
Premium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL
| reply to CMoore2004
said by CMoore2004 :What's half-assed about the EVDO deployment? Well, for one it works great in the wealthy subdivision, but go into a not so wealthy area, and no more EV-DO. That's kind of a problem for a mobile user. The system doesn't hand-off between 1xRTT and EV-DO connections, you know. That leaves the suburbs like Swiss cheese when it comes to EV-DO coverage. Fine for fixed use, but not ready for mobile after six years. What would you call that? |
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pepe675935
@northwestern.edu
| reply to Time4aNAP
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I understood the basic premise as to install such WiMax equipment in areas that do not already have the fiber capacity. Yes, there is excess capacity but in this large country there are places where the redundancy would still be useful. And isn't a Wimax site efficient in the sense that a large number of users can be simultaneously connected w/o degradation in performance(?) |
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CMoore2004
Premium
join:2003-02-06
Jonesville, MI
| reply to Time4aNAP
The only thing that's half-assed is your information. Do you actually HAVE an EVDO card/phone from Sprint? I by no means live in a wealthy city/county and pretty much everywhere I have Sprint service, I have EVDO. Can you speak from experience that it doesn't hand-off between EVDO and 1xRTT? Because I've been going down the freeway at 70 and entered a 1xRTT area and had no problem. I live on a farm. The entire area has no other broadband coverage. It's not a wealthy area. You have no idea what you're talking about.
And they're supposed to have their entire network EVDO by years-end. Who cares about the hand-off? Come back with some educated misinformation.
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Sprint Mobile Broadband PX-500 | Windows XP MCE SP2 | Mobile AMD Athlon 64 4000+ | 1.5GB RAM | ATI Mobile Radeon X600 128MB | 120GB HDD |
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