AppleInsider Staff
One of Japan's largest mobile operators, Softbank, is said to be in talks to buy Sprint Nextel Corp, the third-largest cellular provider in the U.S.
Softbank reportedly seeks to purchase two-thirds of Sprint, giving it control of the company, Bloomberg reported on Thursday. The details apparently come from two people familiar with the discussions.
Softbank may spend spend more than $19 billion, or 1.5 trillion yen, according to Japan's Nikkei newspaper, which did not say where it learned the price.
A potential deal is seen as an opportunity for Softbank to enter the U.S. market by buying out a compatible carrier. Both Softbank in Japan and Sprint in the U.S. use wireless equipment made by Ericsson AB of Sweden.
Sprint inked a deal with Apple last year to begin offering the iPhone to its customers. Reports indicated the company pledged to purchase 30.5 million total iPhones over a four-year span, a commitment of nearly $20 billion that was characterized as a move that "bet the company" on Apple.
Prior to offering the iPhone, Sprint saw a massive subscriber exodus to market leaders Verizon and AT&T. The company also originally bet on WiMAX technology for its high-speed 4G data, but has since begun the switch to LTE. Apple's latest iPhone 5 offers high-speed data over LTE and is not compatible with WiMAX.
In July, Sprint revealed that the iPhone played a major part in bringing new customers to the carrier. In all, 40 percent of iPhone sales in the June quarter were to new postpaid customers.
Andrew Orr
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8 Comments
And I still can't get LTE coverage from SoftBank here in Southern Ibaraki. Wow! Good to know where SoftBank's priorities are!
As a Sprint customer, my only real concern is that if they do get bought out by the Japanese that our new overlords maintain our unlimited data plans :)
As a Sprint customer, my only real concern is that if they do get bought out by the Japanese that our new overlords maintain our unlimited data plans :)
Hey, it's Japan. The country's built around ubiquitous data. The very thought of a cap is foreign to them (and good on them for that).
Here are Softbank's plans for people on the archipelago. I seriously doubt they'd offer anything BUT unlimited plans here if this went through.
Tethering to SEVEN GIGS, unlimited if you don't tether. It pains me to say this, but that's a pretty sweet deal. Pains because I shouldn't have to be saying that at all…
Their pricing is in line with Sprint as well. The 6755 yen figure assumes you have to add those 3 numbers up to reach the total cost of your phone plan.
5460 yen = $69.53
6755 yen = $86.04
Seems like a good fit. Perhaps they'll even throw in a bid for T-Mobile! Not mentioned here are the latest bits of speculation that suggest Clearwire may also be part of a Sprint acquisition. At any rate, anything that gooses CLWR's share price is a welcome development in my book.