By 
T-Mobile’s merger with MetroPCS might have been merely an appetizer for things to come, if new reports surfacing today of SoftBank’s interest in acquiring Sprint pan out. SoftBank, a Japan-based telecom, is said to be in talks to purchase the third-largest carrier in the US, a sale that could go as high as $19 billion when all is said and done.
There are reasons to see the move as beneficial to both parties. SoftBank gets an established base from which they can enter the US market while Sprint gets additional financial support. It wouldn’t be the first time SoftBank rose on the coattails of another. The company launched service in Japan in 2006 after the purchase of Vodafone’s stake in the nation’s wireless market.
If a deal is agreed upon, it will leave AT&T as the last national carrier to be fully headquartered in the US.
Update: Sprint has issued a press release confirming the talks. The statement says that the US carrier “is currently engaged in discussions with Softbank regarding a potential substantial investment by Softbank,” while going on to state, “there can be no assurances that these discussions will result in any transaction or on what terms any transaction may occur, such a transaction could involve a change of control of Sprint.”
[via DroidDog]
Selling the USA one piece at a time.
Seriously. I am not for this at all.
Google, MS and apple will eventually own everybody anyway.
Why are you surprised? With a President that has done all he can to make business in this Country as hard and a financial hardship, it was only a matter of time before more businesses left the country, as it is there isn’t much we don’t HAVE to import since we taxed and regulated just about all industries out of the country
Yeah except that is all thanks to your fellow Republicans, not Obama. He has only encouraged companies to come back.
I’d much rather blame republicans free trade policies and free market (theories) than blame Obama.
Maybe you should blame Obama because the economy really sucks now
maybe you should get educated and realize that the state of the economy has been caused by many factors and by people on both sides of the political spectrum (including republicans *gasp!*) and all the blame can’t rest on one man.
Just to be real, this story is about an international investment in an American company. Softbank and Son are attracted to the American market.
You seem to be wearing your “let’s make this political beanie” on backwards today ;-)
please stfu with your lying bs
Oh Snap!
Maybe they can actually improve T-Mobile’s terrible network.
I literally effing laughed out loud. Most random, mis-placed comment of the year right over here folks. please re-READ buddy.
Now we know why Sprint pulled back on their comments that they might try to outbid TMO for Metro PCS.
And yes, I agree, 1 piece at a time.
They are going to outbid T-Mob for MetroPCS and then be backed by SoftBank
That very well could be true.
US is selling the whole country.
Will this get me my LTE faster?
Maybe, maybe not. Only time can tell.
If yes, then sale it! If not, then we shouldn’t be selling off the U.S one piece at a time.
This sale will take a while if the talks even lead to it, so probably not getting you LTE faster unless you’re in a really rural area and not expecting it for another 2-4 yrs. This could still result in Softbank improving sprint’s coverage and bringing in some new thought and such. It won’t help their weak spectrum holdings though, but who wouldn’t want softbank to own Sprint? I think it sounds awesome, just wish it was NTT DoCoMo instead, they rock.
Awesome! If I get LTE, it’s cool. If not, keep American Companies, American! hahaha…!
Lol I think your the only one who got the joke.
Sent from my EVO 4G LTE
Well Sprint would be more financially fit to spend more money for network expansion, so…
Does that mean people can pay their cellphone bill in Yen? Unlimited everything for ¥79.99 seems pretty appealing
If it was up to republicans they will outsource anything to have a balanced budget…They are so stupid that they might even outsource congress and senate one day because we could a buck or two..
Outsourcing couldn’t be that bad considering the current one doesn’t get anything done.
High taxes and an increasingly burdensome regulatory system is what’s killing American businesses
More than that…shareholders! Squeeze every bit of profit for the present with no thought of the future. Without the middle class, these companies wouldn’T EVEN EXIST. This thinking implies that if taxes were loooow on business, that they would be satisfied with profits. That’s not how capitalism works, buddy.
You mean taxes hat are as low as they’ve been since the 1950’s
I know this is hard for you to believe but money doesn’t grow from trees.
I never said anything about money growing on a tree…All I am saying is outsourcing is not the answer. If we spend money here, people have jobs and they spend the money back in US economy.
Spend what money? Much of it is borrowed from China.
I am talking about U.S tax money that we shouldn’t be sending oversea’s to build a $5 Billion bay area bridge to China.
Money, that’s the really important thing for America businessman, with the excuse of mame jobs.
Crap. I just sold my Sprint stock a couple weeks ago at $5.07…
I hope unlimited data will be here to stay.
That and no price increase.
I’m all for healthy and legit business but man is anything made and owned by the US anymore? Except for guns and tools of course. Hold it down At&t you can do it.
Oh my gosh!! Japanese phones at subsidized prices!!
There goes my unlimited plan.
Does it really matter with this thought of “the selling of America” a lot of these companies don’t even pay taxes in the United States, and not many of them have factories that produce any type of phones in America, nor employed Americas other than the salesman that sells us these smart phones! This a Global market now, we need to wake up realize the power we have as consumers and just demand quality products, no matter who owns these companies.