We're here — it's a pretty corporate affair, all told, with only a sprinkling of media mixed in among the analyst-types. But don't worry, they're playing contemporary rock music. We're going to party.
They're playing Sprint ads on the big screens here — we're told things will start in 10 minutes.
The buzz in the room is that Sprint will announce an LTE migration plan, most likely on the 800MHz band. That's what we've been expecting, but we'll see if there are any surprises.
And we're off! Sprint's VP of investor relations is up. "I want to welcome you to Sprint's Network Vision Strategy Update."
They just put up an amazing Cautionary Statement on the big screen. Hang on while we read it all.
Hang on dudes — the presentation may contain non-GAAP statements? We're out of here.
And Dan Hesse is up!
"Thanks for joining us in New York. We have a good day for you today. It's an update on the evolution of 3G and 4G."
Running down the agenda — they're inviting Samsung, Ericsson, and Alacatel-Lucent on stage later.
"Let's talk about Sprint and our strategy, and what our brand stands for. Our brand stands for simplicity and value."
"We're trying to simplify the customer experience, and simplify the company. You never know, one of these guys in the front row might be running it someday." Laughs all around. "I'm really building them up."
Dan's so smooth.
"We're the current reigning leader in terms of the retail experience."
"The third piece that's so important to simplifying the business is the network. Running two networks is complicated. What you'll see today is a strategy that makes running our network simpler."
Hesse's quoting now. "We set our course by the stars, not by the light of every passing ship."
"Brand is the key to gross adds, and our business is all about subscribers."
"To oversimplify... because I like to simplify. An engaged workforce uses a strong brand to attract new customers, and a strong network to keep them."
"Sprint is the most improved company in terms of customer satisfaction in the past three years... when I got here in Christmas of 2007 it was like catching a falling knife."
"We hit a bottom in late 08 and we're gradually working our way out. We give Verizon their props, that's typically who we're fighting with in terms of brand and reputation."
"In 2010 Sprint's reputation improved more than any company in the world. And we're now in second place in terms of US wireless companies."
"It's all about subscribers... the best tangible metric of how strong your brand it."
Going over the drop in postpaid subs — "Not all subscribers are created equal in terms of lifetime value."
"We were doing a better job of keeping the customers we had, but gross adds declined."
"This was our problem — decline for 12 out of 13 quarters."
Really getting into the nitty-gritty here of subscriber accounting here.
"This is a journey towards improvement — postpaid net add change is what we look at very closely."
"You're seeing Verizon also improve year over year with 4G and with... the iPhone." Guess who's on the money train now though? Dan-man.
