Things might be looking up for Sprint now that they have some extra cash to play but, the 78% that Japanese wireless giant SoftBank bought of the company doesn’t mean that Sprint is instantly saved. In fact, SoftBank’s founder says that turning Sprint’s fortune around would take time, and that nothing happens overnight. As Reuters reports, Masayoshi Son has said that Sprint’s investors will have to be patient. Offering the following advice to those looking for Sprint’s instant recovery:
“It took around a year after SoftBank bought Vodafone (before) we reached the No. 1 position of net gains in subscribers. It takes time to get devices ready and prepare services and the network. At the very least you need half a year or a year. And for anything substantial you need one or two years.”
While this sort of thing is hardly surprising, you don’t just turn around a company in a few months, it is refreshing to see that SoftBank are approaching this in the proper manner. Thanks to the Japanse firm, Sprint now has the capital to expand their LTE network, which is till sorely lacking compared AT&T and Verizon. SoftBank have experience of turning wireless networks around and there’s nothing to suggest that they can’t do the same with Sprint, given the time to do it in.
Earlier this year, SoftBank increased their share in the company to 80%, buying stock from the Open Market. However, Sprint didn’t have a great summer, with drops of 14% in its share price since early August. While things don’t look good for Sprint right now, they’re in a much better position than they were last year.
With the money from SoftBank to roll out more LTE coverage and the Clearwire purchase, the network has more spectrum to play with and the capability to do something with it. They recently launched their One Up program to compete with the other major networks and while it might not seem like it right now, this time next year we might be looking at a very different Sprint.