Sprint Nextel Corporation (NYSE: S) is a telecommunications company based in Overland Park, Kansas.
The company owns and operates the third-largest wireless telecommunications network in United States, with 49.3 million customers, behind Verizon Wireless and AT&T Mobility.
Sprint is a global Internet carrier (Tier 1 network) and makes up a portion of the Internet backbone. In the United States, the company also operates the largest wireless broadband network and is the third-largest long distance provider.
The company was created in 2005 by the $35 billion purchase of Nextel Communications by Sprint Corporation. In 2006, the company spun off its local landline telephone business, naming it Embarq. The company also completed the $6.5 billion acquisition of Nextel Partners, one of its largest affiliates, which primarily provides Nextel wireless services to more rural markets.
Sprint also operates and maintains DCSNet, the U.S. Federal Government's private surveillance network.
In 2009, Sprint announced that the day-to-day operations management of its entire wireless network will be turned over to the Sweden-based Ericsson. Under the deal, Sprint will transfer many of their network operations employees and Ericsson will take over the full maintenance and operations of the Sprint wireless network. Sprint will retain ownership of the network and will have control over the network assets. Additionally Ericsson will be housed within the Sprint headquarters. The transaction is expected to be complete by the end of Q3 2009.
History
United Telecom
The core of the present day Sprint-Nextel Corporation was founded in 1898 by Cleyson Leroy Brown and Carlos Florendo, Jr. under the name of the Brown Telephone Company , in the small town of Abilene, Kansas. Brown Telephone was a landline telephone company operating as a competitor to the Bell System.
In 1938, after emerging from bankruptcy, Brown changed its name to United Utilities. The company grew steadily through acquisitions and, in 1972, changed its name to United Telecommunications , at which time it provided local telephone service in many areas of the Midwest and South. United Telecom also operated many other types of business.
In 1980 United Telecom launched a national X.25 data service, Uninet . To enter the long-distance voice market, United Telecom acquired ISACOMM in 1981 and US Telephone in 1984. In 1983 United Telecom began offering cellular telephone services in their territories under the brand name Telespectrum .
GTE Sprint
Southern Pacific Communications Company (SPC), a unit of the Southern Pacific Railroad, began providing long-distance telephone service after the Execunet II decision late in 1978. SPC was headquartered in Burlingame, California (where Sprint still maintains a technology lab, on Adrian Ct.)
The Railroad had an extensive microwave communications system along its rights of way used for internal communications; later (after the Execunet II decision) they expanded by laying fiber optic cables along the same rights of way. In 1972, they began selling surplus capacity on that system to corporations for use as Private Lines, thereby circumventing AT&T's then-monopoly on public telephony. Prior attempts at offering long distance voice services had not been approved by the Federal Communications Commission, although a fax service (called SpeedFAX ) was permitted.
As mentioned, SPC was only permitted to provide Private Lines, not switched services. When MCI Communications released Execunet , SPC took the FCC to court to get the right to offer switched services, and succeeded (the "Execunet II" decision). They decided they needed a new name to differentiate the switched voice service from SpeedFAX, and ran an internal contest to select one. The winning entry was " Sprint "; the name was never intended to have any special significance, although after it achieved wider public awareness there were attempts to turn it into a backronym.
The Sprint service was first marketed to six metropolitan areas: New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Diego and Anaheim. The switches were located in Los Angeles and New York. A customer was required to have a Private Line connection to one of these switches in order to use the service, and paid an access fee per Private Line. The customer was then billed at 2.6 cents per tenth of a minute increment.
In 1982 SPC became part of GTE under the name GTE Sprint . GTE had previously acquired a national X.25 provider, Telenet , in 1979.
Consolidation and re-branding
In 1986, GTE Sprint and Telenet were merged with the United Telecom properties US Telecom, Uninet and ISACOMM, to form US Sprint . Initially this was a joint venture co-owned by GTE and United. Then in 1988 United sold Telespectrum to Centel to fund the purchase of an additional 30% of US Sprint. This purchase gave United operational control of US Sprint.
In 1989 United Telecom purchased a controlling interest, and in 1991 completed its acquisition of US Sprint. The same year United Telecom changed its name to Sprint, due in large part to the increased brand recognition as a result of the successful Candice Bergen "Dime Lady" advertisement campaign.
Return to wireless
In 1993, Sprint acquired Centel, which allowed them to provide local service in a total of 18 states and put them back in the wireless market. In 1994, Sprint spun off their existing cellular operations as 360 Communications for regulatory reasons, in order to start a new service in the PCS band. In 1998 360 Communications was acquired by Alltel, which was in turn acquired by Verizon in 2009.
In late 1994 and early 1995 Sprint acquired near nationwide PCS spectrum, via Sprint Spectrum (a joint venture between Sprint and several cable companies). Later in 1995, the company began to offer wireless service under the Sprint PCS brand in the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area; this was the very first PCS-based wireless network in the Americas. Although the current Sprint PCS service is CDMA, the original Washington area network used GSM. Eventually Sprint converted that network to CDMA, then in 1999 sold the GSM infrastructure to Omnipoint (which eventually became part of T-Mobile USA).
Partnerships and more consolidation
In September 1996, Sprint announced a deal with RadioShack, and in 1997 Sprint Stores opened at RadioShack to offer their communications services and products through RadioShack Stores across the United States. Since then, over 20 million Sprint cell phones have been sold via the RadioShack outlets. RadioShack was one of the first retailers to offer Sprint services and an all-digital nationwide network for its customers.
On October 5, 1999, Sprint and MCI WorldCom announced a $129 billion merger agreement between the two companies. The deal would have been the largest corporate merger in history at the time. However, the deal did not go through because of pressure from the United States Department of Justice and the European Union on concerns of it creating a monopoly.
In 2003, Sprint began recombining their local telecom, long distance, wireline, and wireless business units into a new company, in an initiative known internally as "One Sprint." In April 2004, the separately traded wireless tracking stock, "PCS," was absorbed into the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) "FON" ticker symbol, Sprint's former ticker symbol. (FON stood for "Fiber Optic Network," but was also a homophone of the word "phone"). This was challenged in many lawsuits by Sprint PCS shareholders who felt robbed because their stock was devalued through the ratio of 1 share of PCS stock for 1/2 share of FON stock. The PCS shareholders claimed a loss of 1.3 billion to 3.4 billion dollars. Sprint agreed to settle with the shareholders for only 57.5 million dollars.
NEXTEL
Main article: NEXTEL CommunicationsNEXTEL was founded as FleetCall in 1987 by Morgan E. O' Brien, a Washington, DC, communications attorney, and Brian D. McAuley and changed its name to Nextel Communications in 1993. In 1995, wireless pioneer Craig McCaw became a significant investor in the company. U.S. Senator and former Virginia Governor Mark Warner was one of the early investors. Daniel Akerson served as CEO of Nextel for part of his career. Tim Donahue replaced Akerson as CEO in 1998.
NEXTEL Communications was formerly traded on the NASDAQ under the ticker "NXTL". It was a Fortune 500 company.
Nextel International
Main article: NII Holdings, Inc.Nextel International was founded in 1996 as a subsidiary of Nextel to operate as a holding company for both mobile service and network infrastructure in foreign countries. It initially operated in Latin America and the Philippines. In 2001, Nextel International declared bankruptcy and re-emerged as NII Holdings, Inc. Following Sprint's purchase of Nextel, Nextel sold off most of its investment in NII; however, NII still markets under the Nextel brand
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