Wells Fargo Senior Analyst Jennifer Fritzsche on Monday speculated it could cost Sprint as much as $93.4 billion to acquire competitor T-Mobile if such a deal were to take place.
Though Sprint parent company SoftBank’s ambitions to do just that have ground to a halt under the Obama administration, it is possible incoming President Donald Trump and his administration would look more favorably on such a merger. While it is far from certain that Trump would give the go ahead, and the financials around such a deal are shaky, Fritzsche noted there are plenty of upsides to a potential merger of the carriers.
“We would expect opex synergies to come from areas including: headcount reduction, billing system consolidation, distribution rationalization, and lower combined advertising and marketing spend,” she wrote. “While these SG&A savings are a significant positive, we believe the potential network synergies from a S/TMUS merger far outweigh SG&A savings. On the network side, this transaction would give the combined company significant mid-and high-band spectrum holdings in key markets, which would reduce future outlays for spectrum costs, as well as rationalize backhaul and tower costs.”
TextNow, an MVNO running on Sprint’s network, announced the availability of a new TextNow SIM Card for customers who want to bring their own devices. The new service allows customers to simply plug in and activate compatible phones, including the latest iPhone and Android devices, on TextNow’s service.
The SIM cards will run customers $5 a pop and come with a free month of service. The company’s calling plans start at just under $14 per month for unlimited voice and text, unlimited 2G data, and 100 MB of 3G or 4G data. The company is able to offer discounted rates thanks to its hybrid use of Wi-Fi and cellular networks.
Tech giant Google is snapping up smartwatch company Chronologics for an undisclosed sum. Chronologics, which was formed in 2014 as a platform for “smart, diverse smartwatches,” made the announcement on its webpage.
The deal comes on the heels of Fitbit’s decision to buy “specific assets” from smartwatch company Pebble last week, including “key personnel and intellectual property related to software and firmware development.” Fitbit’s acquisition notably didn’t include Pebble’s hardware, but the latter company said it would no longer manufacture or sell smartwatches after the transaction.
According a September IDC forecast, smartwatch shipments are only expected to see a small bump in 2016 before ramping up in 2020. Shipment figures for 2016 are only expected to hit 20.1 million units, but will swell to 50 million units by 2020, the report said.
Could Apple jump on board with SoftBank’s $100 billion technology fund announced in October? Maybe so according to a Monday report in the Wall Street Journal. The Journal said Apple has spoken with SoftBank about participating in the fund with an investment of up to $1 billion, but noted no plans have been finalized yet.
Interestingly, SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son recently announced alongside President-elect Donald Trump his plans to invest $50 billion in the United States to help create 50,000 jobs. Reports indicate that money will come from the aforementioned $100 billion technology fund.