Hasta La Gadget!

Sprint’s second quarter figures have arrived, showing that the company’s billion-dollar gamble on the iPhone isn’t working right now. While it sold 1.5 million Apple-branded handsets in the three month period (40 percent to new and postpaid customers), it recorded an operating loss of $629 million and a colossal net loss of $1.4 billion — compared to an operating loss of $255 million and a net loss of $863 million in the first quarter. Operating revenues of $8.8 billion improved on those in the first quarter by a single percent — mostly due to higher service fees from its wireless offerings. It’s also grown its cash reserves, up from $128 million last quarter to $267 million today, and can point to 442,000 postpaid and 141,000 new prepaid subscribers pushing the company’s customer base up to 56 million nationwide — mentioning that 60 percent of former Nextel users chose to remain with Sprint during the enforced change.

The figures reveal that Sprint’s eating around $782 million due to the shutdown of the Nextel platform and a further $184 million to end leases on antenna sites for the moribund network. It’s also having to take a hit of $204 million due to its investment into infrastructure partner Clearwire. It’s affirmed its $1 billion lending facility, contingent upon purchasing gear from Ericsson to help build its LTE network, which it aims to have installed in 12,000 sites by the end of the year. Of course, that purchase was prompted by the collapse of Philip Falcone’s doomed LightSquared project, which caused the Now Network to lose $66 million in cash and its childhood innocence when it comes to trusting other people.

Update: Big Yellow also mentioned that it has no plans to adopt a shared data plan to follow AT&T and Verizon.

Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Internet

Sprint’s iPhone gamble isn’t paying off as 2012 Q2 figures reveal $629 million operating loss originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Jul 2012 07:17:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you thought the list of banned items at the Olympic Games couldn’t get any longer, now the IOC is gunning for that mobile hotspot in your pocket. The prohibited list includes all of the things you’d expect (weapons, alcohol, toxic materials) but also this:

“Personal / private wireless access points and 3G hubs (smart devices such as Android phones, iPhone and tablets are permitted inside venues, but must not be used as wireless points to connect multiple devices)”

Probably best to leave that router at home and make sure you only activate your smartphone’s hotspot when you’re hidden in a crowd, folks.

Filed under: Cellphones, Tablet PCs, Wireless

London bans wireless access points, joy, kittens from the Olympics originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Jul 2012 03:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Not even 24 hours since announcing its new CEO, Yahoo’s announced its financial results for the second quarter, with only a few financial figures of note. Revenue was reported at $1.2 billion, barely changing since the same period last year. Net income totaled $228.5 million, down from $238.5 million from Q2 2011. With its new leader in tow, the company still aims to sell half of its stake in Alibaba, which totals around 20 percent of its shares. Taking a closer look, most of its revenue came Yahoo’s own products; about $535 million came from display ads, while $461 million from search. It reiterated the deal it struck with Facebook when it came to patent issues between the pair and future advertising tie-ups that are still in the pipeline. Hit up the press release for all the details.

Continue reading Yahoo reports Q2 2012 earnings, revenue remains unchanged

Filed under: Internet

Yahoo reports Q2 2012 earnings, revenue remains unchanged originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Jul 2012 16:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Here is an interesting theory: the new dock connector in Apple’s new iPhone 2012 could be a 19-pin port that would be mechanically and electrically compatible with the micro-USB standard. I don’t know what it would be like, but I love the idea. More »