LAS VEGAS — Like most people at CTIA’s Super Mobility Week here, Sprint’s team had one eye on the show floor and the other on a smartphone screen today as news about Apple’s long-awaited iPhone 6 began to break. The new iPhone will be important to all four of the major U.S. carriers, but Sprint probably has the most at stake. Both the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus support the 2.5 GHz band, the cornerstone of the Sprint Spark LTE service.
“This very much changes the conversation for Sprint,” wrote analyst Jennifer Fritzsche of Wells Fargo. “With the iPhone now supporting 2.5 GHz, it moves Sprint’s available LTE spectrum for iPhone users from a 5×5 channel to MULTIPLE 20×20 channels (more than any other carrier). Given that the iPhone represents the majority of its smartphone sell-through, this is a meaningful ‘needle mover.'”
To help nudge that needle Sprint is offering a new financing program it calls “iPhone for Life.” The 16 GB will be offered at $20 per month, along with unlimited data for $50 per month. After two years, the customer can return the iPhone to Sprint in exchange for a newer iPhone. Sprint notes on its website that customers will save $575 by choosing “iPhone for Life” over a traditional two-year contract.
Sprint will also continue to offer its Easy Pay purchase plan. This plan also offers unlimited data, but payments are $10 more per month than they are with “iPhone for Life.” However, customers who choose Easy Pay will own their iPhones after two years, while customers who choose “iPhone for Life” will not.
The success of Sprint’s iPhone offer will probably be tied to the success of its 2.5 GHz LTE rollout. The company appears to be picking up the pace of that rollout, and it expects to end 2014 with 100 million pops covered by its 2.5 GHz LTE.
