We haven’t talked about the Sprint Nextel merger much, but as the July 13th shareholder meeting approaches, we’ll be talking more and more about it. First off, the name. It’s just Sprint (Update: Just to clarify, the Nextel branding will be phased out, it won’t be erased on day one). And, all signs spilling onto the web appear to confirm this. ThatsRacin.com has already reported that Nextel has given NASCAR the heads up to begin preparations to re-brand the Nextel Cup into the Sprint Cup.
As for devices, the transition will be equally quick. Sprint Consumer, Nextel Business was the headline we were planning to run with, but quickly Sprint will turn it to Sprint Consumer, Sprint Business. Here’s how it will work; Sprint PCS devices will occupy the Sprint Consumer lineup, Nextel devices will become the Sprint Business lineup. Sprint’s existing Smart Devices will remain and advances (at an even more enhanced rate than before), to aide in merging the two lineups over the course of the merger.
iDEN isn’t going away. That should be made clear right now. We’ll be going more into iDEN in the future, but while Sprint will want to transition existing customers to CDMA, the network will remain. We’ll have a full merger rundown later this month, so stay tuned.
