Next Mobile to benefit greatly from merger of US telcos Sprint, Nextel

Philippine wireless mobile operator Next Mobile (formerly Nextel Communications Philippines Inc.) expects to benefit greatly, both in terms of increased subscriber base and a wider-reaching technology, from the recent merger of American telecommunications companies Sprint and Nextel.

"The merger between Sprint and Nextel is the best thing that happens to Next Mobile and its customers using its branded IMX mobile phones," Next Mobile Inc. (NMI) president and CEO Mel Velarde said.

The recent $36-billion deal puts Sprint-Nextel as the number three cellular operator in the US with 39 million customers but would lord it over financially having combined year-to-date revenues of $30.3 billion compared to Verizon’s $20.3 billion and Cingular’s $12.3 billion.

"Sprint is smart. After seeing failed experiments by CDMA and GSM players to duplicate Nextel’s push-to-talk service performance to bait and switch the loyal subscribers of the latter, Sprint merged with Nextel on a 50-50 power sharing. Together they can dominate the enterprise and consumer markets in the US," Velarde added.

He noted that consumers and enterprise customers will feel the impact of this major development when new phones with more sophisticated business and lifestyle applications are introduced in the marketplace.

"In the Philippines, NMI customers will be the ultimate winner. The plan of these two telecom giants is to produce a versatile phone that operates on both CDMA and IDEN push-to-talk technologies and introduce broadband wireless services on the phone, PDAs and computers," Velarde emphasized.

The local mobile phone market, primarily dominated by GSM (global system for mobile communications), is expected to feel the tremors of a hybrid mobile phone. NMI sources revealed that the company plans to launch its i930 IMX phones in the first quarter 2005. This phone operates on both IDEN and GSM networks and runs on Microsoft operating system and will be offered with a 365-day/night service with unlimited push-to-talk, unlimited mobile Internet and unlimited GSM. This phone can accommodate existing SIM cards of customers using Smart, Globe or Sun Cellular.

So far, NMI has announced that it is concentrating on its new service for businesses named IMX Telematics, a software/service bundle that integrates servers and mobile phones and extends the monitoring, tracking and revenue-generating capabilities of its corporate customers to remove operating inefficiencies and increase profitability.

"Our goal is to increase our revenue per user and value-added services built on proprietary technologies will deliver this. Any business that has mission-critical operations must have IMX. A simple phone, that requires dialing and priced cheap or expensive cannot do it alone," Velarde said.

Telecom experts say the Sprint-Nextel merger, at first viewed to be a mismatch, may offer new directions for consolidation of players not just in the Philippine mobile phone market but in the regional and Asia-Pacific markets as well.