American telecom carrier Sprint today said its Capex (capital spending) towards infrastructure investment will be nearly $8 billion in 2014. Its Q1 2014 revenue rose to $8.87 billion from $8.79 billion, while net loss improved to $151 million from $643 million.
For the Softbank-owned Sprint, 4G will be one of the focus areas of its Capex plan for this year.
Sprint will expand its 4G LTE coverage to 250 million people from the present 225 million people. Additionally, Sprint’s replacement of its 3G and voice network and the roll-out of high-definition voice service are both expected to be largely complete by mid-year.
The company’s Capex plan will be focussed on the deployment of Sprint Spark, which is capable of delivering 50-60 Mbps now and three times more by 2015.
Sprint today announced the launch of Spark in six more cities, including, Orlando, Fla. and Oakland, Calif. Sprint Spark is now available in 24 markets across the country and 14 Sprint Spark-capable devices are currently available, including the recently launched Samsung Galaxy S 5 and HTC One (M8).
Sprint plans to deploy Sprint Spark in about 100 of America’s largest cities during the next three years, leveraging its 800MHz, 1.9GHz and 2.5GHz spectrum together with devices offering tri-band capability and high-definition voice.
The American telecoms in Q1 2014 invested $1.48 billion in Capex against $1.96 billion in Q4 2013.
Has Sprint gained?
Sprint, which competes with Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile US, said its platform postpaid gross additions grew by over 16 percent, and retail phone sales were under 5 million, representing 84 percent of total retail handset device sales.
Sprint reported a net loss of 231,000 Sprint platform postpaid customers during the quarter largely due to service disruption associated with the company’s ongoing network overhaul. Sprint platform prepaid net loss of 364,000 customers was primarily caused by changes in the Lifeline program recertification process. Sprint added 212,000 wholesale and affiliate customers during the quarter.
Dan Hesse, Sprint CEO, said: “With the expected mid-year completion of the rip and replacement of our core 3G and voice network, the ongoing roll-out of Sprint Spark, and the evolution of Sprint Framily, we plan to build the best customer experience in the industry.”
It’s ver unlikely that Sprint will complete the replacement of its 3 G network by mid year. They still have yet to touch 4000 sites and at ther current rate it will take 7-9 months to complete that work. It’s virtually impossible for Sprint to complete phase 1 this year and phase 2 “Sprint Spark” is being rolled out at an even slower pace.