T-Mobile Event Summary
03/26/2013 12:05
At 8:30 this morning (15 minutes late) T-Mobile had a press conference going over some of the new things that we will see from them: iPhone, new no-contract plan, and 4G LTE networks.
iPhone and other phones: While the iPhone was not the topic of choice at the event (meaning that they didn’t talk about it), it was announced on T-Mobiles website that the iPhone 5 would be coming on April 12th for a half-price $99. The iPhone 5 will work in all 3 layers of T-Mobile’s network: 1900 spectrum, AWS spectrum, and LTE. It will start in LTE and migrate to HSPA+ if you drop out of coverage.
All smart phones including the iPhone 5, BlackBerry Z100, Samsung Galaxy S4, and the HTC One will be $99. For popular phones it will be an additional $20 charge per month; less for less popular phones.
The iPhone 4 and 4S will also be available for purchase. The Samsung Galaxy S4 will come to T-Mobile on May 1st.
Plans: At the beginning of the event they showed two videos, the first one was of Jason Jones interviewing people in New York. He asked them what it’s like to have a 2-year contract. Some people said that it was like having a root canal and others said it was like being slapped around by a carrier. After that was a western film with people saying that they like controlling people (all leading up to the new no-contract plan).
After that, T-Mobile’s CEO came out and said that they are unfairly compared to prepaid plans. He also said that you could spend $1,000 less for a device on T-Mobile than AT&T.
Legere said that if you decide to leave after one or 10 payments, you can leave with no obligations except for the price of the phone. If you even want to start thinking about getting a plan with them you need to take a look at your credit first. You need to have a good credit before you can get a phone with them.
LTE services: Legere said they are improving their bandwidth and have more bandwidth than they know what to do with right now. He said that they are adding new 4G networks in 7 major areas: Baltimore, Houston, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Phoenix, San Jose, Calif., and Washington, D.C by the beginning of summer.
------
Throughout the event, Legere kept comparing them to AT&T and how much better they are then AT&T. At the end there was time to answer some questions and he finally told why they are focusing on AT&T. “We remember our first iPhone, but we hated the network experience. A lot of it is attributed to AT&T.”