Eric Friedebach wrote:
> Sprint Corp. and Nextel Communications Inc. are in merger discussions,
> according to press reports.
I've said this in quite a few forums, and I'll say it here: that
anyone would THINK of merging these two companies defies any
reasonable logic. The two networks that are run by Nextel (iDEN) and
Sprint (CDMA 2000 1x) have very little in common, offer a very
different feature set, and are completely and entirely incompatible
with each other.
Invariably, a merger would require a cost savings to work out, and
that would inevitably mean integrating the two networks ... something
which would be a total nightmare, and would mean that at least half of
the user base would be angered that their feature set would be lost in
favor of the other. Not to mention the expense involved in swapping
out customer equipment in order to permit this integration (and
considering the Sprint's top of the line "smart" phones cost upwards
of $600 and Nextel's top of the line models are upwards of $400, they
had BETTER have a plan in place to make sure the phones either
compatible with the integrated network, or that they are replaced with
comparable equipment that IS compatible).
With Cingular and AT&T, the "synergy" of a merger was easy to see:
both networks were similar, used the same standards, and even had the
same lineage (started out AMPS, switched to TDMA, and evolving to
GSM/EDGE). No equipment swapout is necessary because the equipment is
largely the same.
With Sprint and Nextel, there is no such synergy, and I would
seriously doubt the long- or even medium-term viability of the merged
entity.
E-mail fudged to thwart spammers.
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Isaiah Beard (sacredpoet@sacredpoet.com)