3Q 2006 Wireless Carrier Results

Jackzwick wrote:

> Duh, where do you think Sprint gets the offnetwork coverage from? - Most
> of it is Verizon !!!

The issue here is that Verizon has eliminated a lot of off-network
roaming with America's Choice II that existed in the original America's
Choice plan, while Sprint has retained this off-network roaming. It's
roaming that I used extensively on my old America's Choice plan, that
new Verizon customers don't get, but that new Sprint customers do get.

On the other hand, Sprint doesn't let you roam onto Verizon's network in
areas where Sprint has its own network, and usually Sprint's network is
much worse than Verizon's network, due to several factors, but
especially due to the 1900 MHz versus 800 MHz spectrum.

---

› See More: 3Q 2006 Wireless Carrier Results

SMS wrote:
> Jackzwick wrote:
>
>> Yup Sprint Marketshare and profitability down, churn up.
>
> Sprint is in serious trouble. It's really too bad as they actually are
> pretty good, with their off-network roaming and their extensive data
> network. They actually do have better coverage in terms of area, when
> you include roaming, than Cingular or Verizon, though in the metro areas
> where Sprint has coverage, their coverage is worse than Verizon or
> Cingular.
>
>> And soon, despite Navas insisting to me it could never happen, Verizon
>> will have more customers than Cingular.
>
> We'll see. If the trends continue that will be the case, but things can
> change.

Following up on my own post, if you look at the raw total numbers of new
addtions, it's been falling for the last two quarters, by a significant
amount. Cingular's number of new additions has fallen for four quarters,
100,000 to 200,000 less every quarter, while Verizon has been increasing
their new additions by about 100,000 each quarter. At the present rates,
it would take about ten more quarters to close the gap.

What's more likely is that during the next few years is that there is
CDMA consolidation, similar to the AT&T Wireless/Cingular consolidation.
Verizon may end up buying a company like Alltel, which is not doing so
well financially.

Sprint coverage in Metro areas is as good or better than Cingular or
Verizon. Zwickie needs to recheck his facts.

"SMS" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> SMS wrote:
>> Jackzwick wrote:
>>
>>> Yup Sprint Marketshare and profitability down, churn up.
>>
>> Sprint is in serious trouble. It's really too bad as they actually are
>> pretty good, with their off-network roaming and their extensive data
>> network. They actually do have better coverage in terms of area, when you
>> include roaming, than Cingular or Verizon, though in the metro areas
>> where Sprint has coverage, their coverage is worse than Verizon or
>> Cingular.
>>
>>> And soon, despite Navas insisting to me it could never happen, Verizon
>>> will have more customers than Cingular.
>>
>> We'll see. If the trends continue that will be the case, but things can
>> change.
>
> Following up on my own post, if you look at the raw total numbers of new
> addtions, it's been falling for the last two quarters, by a significant
> amount. Cingular's number of new additions has fallen for four quarters,
> 100,000 to 200,000 less every quarter, while Verizon has been increasing
> their new additions by about 100,000 each quarter. At the present rates,
> it would take about ten more quarters to close the gap.
>
> What's more likely is that during the next few years is that there is CDMA
> consolidation, similar to the AT&T Wireless/Cingular consolidation.
> Verizon may end up buying a company like Alltel, which is not doing so
> well financially.

Mij Adyaw wrote:
> Sprint coverage in Metro areas is as good or better than Cingular or
> Verizon. Zwickie needs to recheck his facts.

Nope, it was me that wrote that. Sprint's coverage is significantly
worse in metro areas, just look at the results of the independent surveys.

Part of the reason is due to the fact that they operate at 1900 MHz.
This means that they need more towers to cover a given area, and that
signal penetration into big-box type buildings is worse.

At least in California, Sprint has serious problems in the metro areas.
In fact they actually will let people out of their contracts without a
termination fee if their service doesn't provide coverage at the
subscriber's home.

I was talking to someone at work, who had Sprint for years, and NEVER
had coverage at her house. She didn't worry about it because she did
have coverage most other places, but eventually when her kids went off
to college, she wanted a service that she could use from home with
mobile to mobile, so she switched carriers to Cingular.

One of the other reasons that Sprint has such issues, also related to
1900 MHz, is the NIMBY attitude of many neighborhoods to cell towers.
When the residents are fighting towers, they always bring up the
argument, "hey Verizon and Cingular have coverage without a tower
there." They put T-Mobile and Sprint in a tough situation, because the
carrier has to admit the reason why they need more towers than the
competition, but the attitude of the planning commissions is often,
"hey, that's not our problem."

On Fri, 10 Nov 2006 07:30:19 -0800, SMS <[email protected]>
wrote in <[email protected]>:

>Jackzwick wrote:
>
>> Duh, where do you think Sprint gets the offnetwork coverage from? - Most
>> of it is Verizon !!!
>
>The issue here is that Verizon has eliminated a lot of off-network
>roaming with America's Choice II that existed in the original America's
>Choice plan, while Sprint has retained this off-network roaming. It's
>roaming that I used extensively on my old America's Choice plan, that
>new Verizon customers don't get, but that new Sprint customers do get.
>
>On the other hand, Sprint doesn't let you roam onto Verizon's network in
>areas where Sprint has its own network, and usually Sprint's network is
>much worse than Verizon's network, due to several factors, but

Fewer towers.

>especially due to the 1900 MHz versus 800 MHz spectrum.

Not a real issue.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cingular_Wireless_FAQ>

On Thu, 09 Nov 2006 20:52:01 -0800, SMS <[email protected]>
wrote in <[email protected]>:

>Scott wrote:
>
>> Really? You are incapable of being objective and yet you point out the
>> flaw in others.
>>
>> Stones- glass houses... do you get the picture, or should I be much
>> simpler about it for your dinosaur brain to process?
>
>The data is what it is. I honestly don't know what he's so upset about.

Not upset at all. My forecast is proving out. Yours, not so much.

>Thanks for all the interest. The number of hits on this page has been
>extremely high, ...

Double digits?

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cingular_Wireless_FAQ>

On Fri, 10 Nov 2006 08:25:26 -0800, "Mij Adyaw" <[email protected]>
wrote in <[email protected]>:

>Sprint coverage in Metro areas is as good or better than Cingular or
>Verizon. ...

In some areas, yes, but in other areas, no. On balance overall, Sprint
is well behind both Cingular and Verizon on native network coverage.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cingular_Wireless_FAQ>

On Fri, 10 Nov 2006 10:35:04 -0800, SMS <[email protected]>
wrote in <[email protected]>:

>Mij Adyaw wrote:
>> Sprint coverage in Metro areas is as good or better than Cingular or
>> Verizon. Zwickie needs to recheck his facts.
>
>Nope, it was me that wrote that. Sprint's coverage is significantly
>worse in metro areas, just look at the results of the independent surveys.
>
>Part of the reason is due to the fact that they operate at 1900 MHz.
>This means that they need more towers to cover a given area, and that
>signal penetration into big-box type buildings is worse.

That's nonsense, as I've shown before. The only significant factor in
urban areas is the number and placement of towers, not frequency.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cingular_Wireless_FAQ>

#1 - you have shown NOTHING before... opinion yes, facts - no.

#2 number of towers IS a function of frequency used. Physics me boy...


"John Navas" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected]...
> On Fri, 10 Nov 2006 10:35:04 -0800, SMS <[email protected]>
> wrote in <[email protected]>:
>
>>Mij Adyaw wrote:
>>> Sprint coverage in Metro areas is as good or better than Cingular or
>>> Verizon. Zwickie needs to recheck his facts.
>>
>>Nope, it was me that wrote that. Sprint's coverage is significantly
>>worse in metro areas, just look at the results of the independent surveys.
>>
>>Part of the reason is due to the fact that they operate at 1900 MHz.
>>This means that they need more towers to cover a given area, and that
>>signal penetration into big-box type buildings is worse.
>
> That's nonsense, as I've shown before. The only significant factor in
> urban areas is the number and placement of towers, not frequency.
>
> --
> Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
> John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cingular_Wireless_FAQ>

Nessnet wrote:
> #1 - you have shown NOTHING before... opinion yes, facts - no.
>
> #2 number of towers IS a function of frequency used. Physics me boy...

Yes, this is true. Even Cingular is now admitting this, which is rather
amusing to me, since when the western region was 1900 MHz only they
couldn't state the real reason why the coverage was so poor. Instead
they used statements like, 'we're the new carrier and we are still
building out or network.'

On 10 Nov 2006 16:22:43 -0800, [email protected] wrote in
<[email protected]>:

>Nessnet wrote:
>> #1 - you have shown NOTHING before... opinion yes, facts - no.

I've actually posted authoritative citations.

>> #2 number of towers IS a function of frequency used. Physics me boy...

Physics has nothing to do with it. Try again.

>Yes, this is true. Even Cingular is now admitting this, which is rather
>amusing to me, since when the western region was 1900 MHz only they
>couldn't state the real reason why the coverage was so poor. Instead
>they used statements like, 'we're the new carrier and we are still
>building out or network.'

Yet another unsubstantiated claim that simply doesn't hold water..

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cingular_Wireless_FAQ>

John Navas <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> On 10 Nov 2006 16:22:43 -0800, [email protected] wrote in
> <[email protected]>:
>
>>Nessnet wrote:
>>> #1 - you have shown NOTHING before... opinion yes, facts - no.
>
> I've actually posted authoritative citations.


Yes you have- and not had any true experience with any of it. Finding it
on Google doesn't qualify as authoratative information, Novice.
>
>>> #2 number of towers IS a function of frequency used. Physics me boy...
>
> Physics has nothing to do with it. Try again.


Nice try, Johnny.

>
>>Yes, this is true. Even Cingular is now admitting this, which is rather
>>amusing to me, since when the western region was 1900 MHz only they
>>couldn't state the real reason why the coverage was so poor. Instead
>>they used statements like, 'we're the new carrier and we are still
>>building out or network.'
>
> Yet another unsubstantiated claim that simply doesn't hold water..
>


It is substantiated- Google is your friend.

SMS wrote:
> One of the other reasons that Sprint has such issues, also related to
> 1900 MHz, is the NIMBY attitude of many neighborhoods to cell towers.
> When the residents are fighting towers, they always bring up the
> argument, "hey Verizon and Cingular have coverage without a tower
> there." They put T-Mobile and Sprint in a tough situation, because the
> carrier has to admit the reason why they need more towers than the
> competition, but the attitude of the planning commissions is often,
> "hey, that's not our problem."

That logic goes both ways. Sprint and T-Mobile might have towers in
place and Verizon and Cingular get denied.

John Navas wrote:
> On 10 Nov 2006 16:22:43 -0800, [email protected] wrote in
> <[email protected]>:
>
>> Nessnet wrote:
>>> #1 - you have shown NOTHING before... opinion yes, facts - no.
>
> I've actually posted authoritative citations.

Lets see...you made a statement that frequency has nothing to do with
propagation. That was simply incorrect - higher frequencies have greater
path loss. Raterh admit you were incorrect, you started citing examples of
other reasons that are more likely to affect propagation - which was
correct, but none of them supported you claim that higher frequencies do
not suffer reduced path losses.

>>> #2 number of towers IS a function of frequency used. Physics me boy...
>
> Physics has nothing to do with it. Try again.

Ummm...Radio propagation is part of the physics landscape. Try again.



Scott wrote:
> John Navas <[email protected]> wrote in
> news:[email protected]:
>
>> On 10 Nov 2006 16:22:43 -0800, [email protected] wrote in
>> <[email protected]>:
>>
>>> Nessnet wrote:
>>>> #1 - you have shown NOTHING before... opinion yes, facts - no.
>> I've actually posted authoritative citations.
>
>
> Yes you have- and not had any true experience with any of it. Finding it
> on Google doesn't qualify as authoratative information, Novice.

Again, I have asked when was the last time you opened up a Motorola or
Nokia base station to do maintenance or climbed a tower to replace an
antenna. You simply aren't a professional in cellular communications, as
some of us are.

decaturtxcowboy wrote:

> That logic goes both ways. Sprint and T-Mobile might have towers in
> place and Verizon and Cingular get denied.

It's rarely the case, because in most cases Verizon and Cingular have
the legacy 800 MHz networks (after a series of mergers, acquisitions,
etc. (except in a few major metro areas like South Florida, and parts of
Texas).

So not only do Verizon and Cingular have towers in places where they
were able to get them in before planning commissions knew what was
happening, they also have the huge advantage of the better spectrum.
It's an advantage that is nearly impossible to overcome, especially in
suburban and rural areas, because even if Sprint and T-Mobile could get
approval for sufficient towers to equal the coverage of Cingular and
Verizon, the cost of putting in so many towers would hurt their margins.

In the dense metro areas, the advantage is not as great, but in most
metro areas you have a few dense cities surrounded by vast suburban areas.