The end is coming for feature phones on BT

[primetechv2]

The Boost Talk and Text plan is a limited time gimmick ... I mean promotion.

...

The multi-brand prepaid approach along with agressively expanding their mvno business had helped Sprint get past their dark iDen days. With the new iPhone subscribers now starting to help lucrative post paid subscriber gains, Sprint seems to be back on the right track. It took years to get past the HORRIBLE Nextel acqusition and the subsequent Nextel subscriber loses, but the future for Sprint is looking much better.

Forgive me for slicing up your post.

The new (?) Boost plan seems to hit the roots of the old Boost promise, which was just unlimited everything. Before smartphones Boost didn't emphasize the data, now that smartphones are there, Boost is trying to capitalize on it. And personally I think they deserve their place next to Virgin for value now, because hicks like me with free options know that of Virgin works at their house, Sprint does too.


It's funny you refer to the iPhone acquisition as a good thing for Sprint, most people see anything they've done starting with an I as a bad idea.

[billm261]

The new (?) Boost plan seems to hit the roots of the old Boost promise, which was just unlimited everything.

It's funny you refer to the iPhone acquisition as a good thing for Sprint, most people see anything they've done starting with an I as a bad idea.

The 45 -> 30 plan looks interesting but unless your putting it on a flip phone why not spend the extra 5 and get data on a feature phone? I'm wondering if MMS is included?

The iPhone commitment is anything but lucrative as it is said to take 14 months for that customer to become profitable.
Without it though, Sprint may have actually lost 349K postpaid customers. Tough spot to be in from the carriers position for sure.
Hence the rumored arrival of the iPhone 4 on prepaid I guess.

[vmobi]

Forgive me for slicing up your post.

The new (?) Boost plan seems to hit the roots of the old Boost promise, which was just unlimited everything. Before smartphones Boost didn't emphasize the data, now that smartphones are there, Boost is trying to capitalize on it. And personally I think they deserve their place next to Virgin for value now, because hicks like me with free options know that of Virgin works at their house, Sprint does too.


It's funny you refer to the iPhone acquisition as a good thing for Sprint, most people see anything they've done starting with an I as a bad idea.

Boost Mobile has been mismanaged since Sprint reassigned Carter. After VM's Schulman left for AMEX, they should have reappointed Boost's Carter to run SPG. Boost can be Sprint's profit leader if they can focus and expand on that brands strength, Tiered Unlimited Service Options. Everyone seems to forget that these are still phone companies. The feature that I always liked about the old Unlimited by BOOST service was that every tier included Unlimited Talk. At the time Unlimited Talk for $45 was a bargain compared to Unlimited Service on Sprint for $100+...

That is also why VM PayLo should also add an Unlimited Talk option. Although at this time I just renew the $30 plan if I run out of minutes. $60 for 3,000 minutes is almost like having an Unlimited Plan on PayLo.

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[primetechv2]

Maybe Boost it's going to start offering a stronger lineup of feature phones again, and attempt to pull away the PayLo customers. Overall their unlimited plans seem like a better deal alongside PayLo's offerings, and to their credit Boost hasn't yet abandoned their feature phones.

To me, at least, PayLo seems like a relatively bad play by Virgin. I can't speak for everybody, but dividing a prepaid brand against itself will probably weaken it. I also can't see beyond using almost no data, because that's what BeyondTalk is known for - it's virtually designed for smartphones, without a premium fee attached.

[vmobi]

Maybe Boost it's going to start offering a stronger lineup of feature phones again, and attempt to pull away the PayLo customers. Overall their unlimited plans seem like a better deal alongside PayLo's offerings, and to their credit Boost hasn't yet abandoned their feature phones.

To me, at least, PayLo seems like a relatively bad play by Virgin. I can't speak for everybody, but dividing a prepaid brand against itself will probably weaken it. I also can't see beyond using almost no data, because that's what BeyondTalk is known for - it's virtually designed for smartphones, without a premium fee attached.

Sprint will definitely need to do something with Boost, after the 3+ million iDen subscriber losses they need to do whatever it takes to invigorate what was once the leading unlimited prepaid brand in America. It is not the 1st time Sprint has neglected Boost Mobile. They lost over 1 million Unlimited by Boost subscribers when they focused the brand on the original iDen $50 unlimited plan. Many of which left to cricket, metropcs, and numerous other regional prepaid services. Hopefully this last gasp effort to refocus Boost onto it's true strength (unlimited talk & text), will allow Sprint to proceed with expanding Virgin Mobile with more smartphones and additional OS platforms.


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[primetechv2]

Sprint will definitely need to do something with Boost, after the 3+ million iDen subscriber losses they need to do whatever it takes to invigorate what was once the leading unlimited prepaid brand in America. It is not the 1st time Sprint has neglected Boost Mobile. They lost over 1 million Unlimited by Boost subscribers when they focused the brand on the original iDen $50 unlimited plan. Many of which left to cricket, metropcs, and numerous other regional prepaid services. Hopefully this last gasp effort to refocus Boost onto it's true strength (unlimited talk & text), will allow Sprint to proceed with expanding Virgin Mobile with more smartphones and additional OS platforms.

Oh, I'm sure that's a vision that we can all live with, except for the part where Boost still offers more unlimited smartphone data than Virgin. Maybe I was the only person thinking of going to Boost because of that, but generally it feels like the two companies are constantly squaring off. They even go so far as to attract customers based on their devices coolness or features. Hence the Marquee on Boost, the two low-end keyboard Androids released at the same time, etc.