Back in 2013, T-Mobile finalized their acquisition of MetroPCS, a smaller carrier based in the US as well. Now according to T-Mobile’s plan, they were looking to decommission MetroPCS’ network starting in 2015, but it seems that the plan could be moved up and could see the decommission take place before the end of 2014.
This is mainly due to the fact that statistics have shown that 40% of MetroPCS’ customers have since switched phones that will be compatible with T-Mobile’s network, meaning that customer migration is taking place at a faster rate than expected. That and the fact that about a quarter of the spectrum received by T-Mobile in the acquisition has since been reused for T-Mobile’s LTE network.
According to Braxton Carter, T-Mobile’s CFO, “We were able to get this done more quickly than we had expected. We were conservative in our original projections. But we think this will offer a lot of synergies that will result in cost savings in the future.” Based on the rate that they are going, T-Mobile expects that only a few MetroPCS customers will experience disruptions by the time MetroPCS’ infrastructure has been closed, although hopefully as this story gains more attention, more MetroPCS customers will begin to make the jump. So, is anyone sad to see MetroPCS go?