Wireless service provider Sprint will publish its annual financial results and subscriber counts on May 3, the Overland Park, Kansas-based company announced earlier this week. Following the publication of results in its fiscal 2016 that ended on March 31, the firm will hold a traditional conference call with industry analysts and investors and is expected to address some topical questions and concerns regarding its business operations, including its rapidly increasing debt and rumors about a potential merger with T-Mobile that its parent company SoftBank may be looking to complete.
The upcoming conference call will mark Sprint’s first public interaction with investors after its Chairman Masayoshi Son implied SoftBank may both choose to acquire another company in an effort to merge it with Sprint or end up selling the fourth largest wireless carrier in the United States. The Tokyo-based conglomerate currently controls over 80 percent of Sprint’s shares and reportedly isn’t satisfied with the company’s financial performance. Son — also the Chief Executive Officer at SoftBank — wanted to acquire T-Mobile and merge it with Sprint as early as 2014 but was effectively prevented from doing so by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) under the former Obama administration. As the recently elected Trump administration repeatedly signaled it’s more open towards major consolidations in the telecommunications industry than its predecessor, SoftBank may revive its plans to acquire the third largest mobile service provider in the country and combine it with Sprint in an effort to create a new telecom giant.
In addition to rumors about a potential merger with T-Mobile that will likely come up during the upcoming conference call, Sprint Chief Executive Officer Marcelo Claure may also be asked to comment on hundreds of stores the company recently lost, all of which were shared with RadioShack. Regardless, merger talks will likely be the highlight of Sprint’s conference call, especially since the company was so far prevented from discussing any potential deals due to a federal spectrum auction that was concluded just recently. An update on the situation is expected to follow in the coming weeks but regardless of its contents, it seems likely that Sprint will be looking to make some major changes in the near future.