Amazon mulls Boost buy as T-Mobile and Sprint seek merger approval, report says

A report on Thursday claims Amazon is interested in buying Boost mobile from T-Mobile and Sprint as America's third- and fourth-largest wireless carriers work to appease regulators in a proposed merger.

The massive online retailer is considering buying Boost in an effort to gain access to T-Mobile's wireless network for the next six years — at a minimum. T-Mobile and Sprint have already agreed to part ways with the Boost brand in an attempt to lower their combined market share ahead of the planned merger, reports Reuters.

Boost Mobile is a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) under the Sprint umbrella that sells prepaid plans for talk, text, and data. The sale of Boost could be in the ballpark of $3 billion dollars according to other potential bidders.

The report also asserts that Amazon is interested in picking up any wireless spectrum that the two carriers are looking to sell.

Amazon currently doesn't make any phone or cellular products, but if the company had its own cellular network or access to "New T-Mobile's" network, it could build the technology into existing products such as the Fire line in an effort to better compete with the likes of Apple.

As for the T-Mobile-Sprint merger, the Department of Justice has reportedly pushed the telcos to bring their divested resources together to create a new, smaller carrier that could compete against the newly conjoined company, as well as AT&T and Verizon. Selling Boost alone wouldn't seem to be enough to win over regulators, and doing so might might make it more difficult to meet DOJ demands.

FCC chairman Ajit Pai has already said he will approve the merger, though the Justice Department has not voiced the same enthusiasm and is taking a more conservative approach.