[ZMc1834]

BGR just published an interview with Sprint's VP of Product Development, and when questions about Sprint carrying the Bold Touch 9930, Fared had this to say:

"The bottom line is that we have a good relationship with them; we’re one of their key partners around the world. They’re a platform company, and whenever they offer a platform they typically offer it to all carriers, so I’ll just leave it at that. It’s like the Curve… it’s a global platform. Bold has also been a global platform. It’s very rare that they do something that’s unique to just one carrier and if they do that, they typically don’t announce it in a global event like that. So I’ll just leave it at that, and you can extrapolate form there."

My take from these comments are that the Bold Touch will be available to all and Sprint should be offering this phone. No word on release date or anything, but just thought I would share and look for other interpretations of the stated comment. Also, here is the link for the entire interview:

http://http://www.bgr.com/2011/05/11...nt-fared-adib/

[CranBerry413]

That is Great to hear from Sprint. I'm ready for the phone to drop. I am glad that Sprint & RIM have a "Good" relationship.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[maevinj]

Could we also go as far from his comments, that the Bold Touch will be going to all Carriers, and then there would still be exclusives like the Torch 2 for ATT and The Monaco for Verizon. It might explain why they only announced the Bold Touch at BBW. The Carrier exclusives will get announced later and closer to their launch dates

[rollingrock1988]

what about the curve line though, everyone gets those as well.

[leftypepper716]

I wish Sprint would just announce, "Yes, we will be carrying the Bold 9930 and will be releasing it shortly" and not all the legaleese of cannot confirm or deny or extrapolate lol

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[Skeevecr]

Could we also go as far from his comments, that the Bold Touch will be going to all Carriers, and then there would still be exclusives like the Torch 2 for ATT and The Monaco for Verizon. It might explain why they only announced the Bold Touch at BBW. The Carrier exclusives will get announced later and closer to their launch dates

Why do people persist in this idea that Verizon are going to get the Monaco as an exclusive, if you look at things logically there is no real basis for that to happen just because they got the other two in the past, the orders rim will expect for that model from the states will be far more than Verizon will be prepared to order and as such that model is going to end up going to most if not all the north american carriers.

[Skeevecr]

I wish Sprint would just announce, "Yes, we will be carrying the Bold 9930 and will be releasing it shortly" and not all the legaleese of cannot confirm or deny or extrapolate lol

They probably want to make it official when they are ready to confirm the date it will ship.

[lnichols]

I'm personally done with Sprint this Summer. Their only plan for the future right now is to oppose the T-Mobile/AT&T merger. The Clearwire partnership is a disaster and WiMax will make them an oddball with most of the world. The Nextel network should have been killed off and the spectrum reharvested and they could be deploying LTE on that spectrum right now, but they just signed a three year extension to keep that network running. Combine that with their constant adding new fees here and there and they are pricing themselves out of the Family Plan market and I just don't see a positive future. I've been with them 10 years now and CDMA was awesome and light years ahead when compared to 2G GSM, but now that 3G GSM is CDMA based, and so is HSPA, they lost that edge.

[leftypepper716]

I understand your frustration, but Sprint even with it's $10.00 per smartphone increase is still less expensive than At&t or Verizon and on par with T-Mobile. My fiance and I have the BlackBerry 1500 mins data plan and it's $129.00, Verizon charges $120.00 for just ONE device AND you can only use the mobile to mobile on Verizon phones, unlike Sprint, where you can call ANY mobile phone for free. I think Sprint seeing that 4G isnt going to be available to most of the US until later this year or even next year, now is deffirring the cost as $10.00 extra per every smartphone, instead of what they where trying to do originally by charging $10.00 4G data on the Evo when it was 1st released. but again, overall...Sprint IS less expensive than At&t or Verizon.

[leftypepper716]

They probably want to make it official when they are ready to confirm the date it will ship.

I'm sure you are right about that. I actually got a reply last week from Sprintcares.com when I asked if Sprint was getting the Bold 9930? and when? they replied back "Unfortunately we cannot speculate at this time as there is no official announcement. I would frequently check the links that I provided to you earlier that way you can keep up to date." they referred thier two links sprint.com/newsroom & sprint.com/comingsoon So I would assume with this and Fared Adib's statement, that Sprint will be getting the Bold 9930, and hopefully it will be the 1st CDMA carrier releasing it before end of June. After all, Sprint DOES have the Style 9670 lol...if they will sell that, they will absolutly carry the flagship Bold 9930 (just kidding about the Style 9670, my fiance has it and loves it, it really is a decent little device)

[lnichols]

I understand your frustration, but Sprint even with it's $10.00 per smartphone increase is still less expensive than At&t or Verizon and on par with T-Mobile. My fiance and I have the BlackBerry 1500 mins data plan and it's $129.00, Verizon charges $120.00 for just ONE device AND you can only use the mobile to mobile on Verizon phones, unlike Sprint, where you can call ANY mobile phone for free. I think Sprint seeing that 4G isnt going to be available to most of the US until later this year or even next year, now is deffirring the cost as $10.00 extra per every smartphone, instead of what they where trying to do originally by charging $10.00 4G data on the Evo when it was 1st released. but again, overall...Sprint IS less expensive than At&t or Verizon.

Right but I have 4 phones right now at $200 after taxes, and Sprint makes me keep the BB international plan on for an additional $40 per month instead of turning on/off when needed like I use to. Now with the $10 fee it will go up to $240 if I upgraded the phones, plus the $40 for international. T-Mobile is about $200 for 4 phones. **** AT&T is about $240 for four phones. Sprint is great if the price is lower, but if the same, then I'm paying more for less because WiMax and CDMA are not better than 3G GSM, HSPA+ or LTE. Maybe if Sprint announce some sort of coherent plan for the future that didn't include WiMax I'd come up with some reason to stay, but they have done nothing to the network in a long time and went all in on WiMax, and don't have the financials in place to do a major course correction.

[leftypepper716]

I'd call customer service and speak to a supervisor, tell them that you want to stay with Sprint and tell them what price you want to keep it at, and what plan(s) you need. Who knows? They may be able to work out somthing comparable to the other carriers. They want to keep their current subscribers and will work with you, I'm sure they don't wanna lose a good customer because of a few dollars. Call them, it isn't gonna hurt, right?

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[lnichols]

I'd call customer service and speak to a supervisor, tell them that you want to stay with Sprint and tell them what price you want to keep it at, and what plan(s) you need. Who knows? They may be able to work out somthing comparable to the other carriers. They want to keep their current subscribers and will work with you, I'm sure they don't wanna lose a good customer because of a few dollars. Call them, it isn't gonna hurt, right?

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

It's not just the money. That is decent part of it, but what is the plan going forward? We know that Verizon is aggressively rolling out LTE to eventually replace CDMA. AT&T HSPA+, and if the T-Mobile acquisition happens LTE with the AWS spectrum. T-Mobile is doing HSPA+ 42, and if the AT&T merger doesn't happen then they get $3 Billion in cash from AT&T and they weren't going to LTE until about 2014-15 anyways with HSPA+ 84 as an option. WiMax expansion has stagnated because Clear is in severe financial crush, and it is obvious that WiMax is not what the rest of the world will be using and LTE will be the next standard the world deploys. I don't see a WiMax BB coming out, so that means that I would have to upgrade to a device that can't do simultaneous voice/data. Look at the 4G coverage for Northern VA, the "Internet capitol of the world", and its pathetic and this area that actually has some major Sprint office locations and the old Nextel headquarters. The only major moves Sprint has announced lately are a three year maintenance deal with Motorola for the iDen network, and a refresh of the CDMA infrastructure to CDMA, and they and Clear are fighting over money and ways to do business. I don't really feel comfortable tying myself to Sprint for two more years with a network that is going nowhere, when everyone else is investing heavily in their networks.

[leftypepper716]

I'm sure Sprint will be on par with the other big 3...they wouldn't drag their heels while everyone else is passing them by...I myself believe that Sprint will be 4G ready by next year, and that by extension, RIM will rebound with the Bold 9900/9930 this year to carry over to the QNX 4G OS they'll have. So when the Bold 9930 is released. On Sprint, I will be confident that I will have the best BlackBerry device on a carrier that WILL keep improving.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[Snipperdo17]

I understand your frustration, but Sprint even with it's $10.00 per smartphone increase is still less expensive than At&t or Verizon and on par with T-Mobile. My fiance and I have the BlackBerry 1500 mins data plan and it's $129.00, Verizon charges $120.00 for just ONE device AND you can only use the mobile to mobile on Verizon phones, unlike Sprint, where you can call ANY mobile phone for free. I think Sprint seeing that 4G isnt going to be available to most of the US until later this year or even next year, now is deffirring the cost as $10.00 extra per every smartphone, instead of what they where trying to do originally by charging $10.00 4G data on the Evo when it was 1st released. but again, overall...Sprint IS less expensive than At&t or Verizon.

Right now, I'm at 203/month for 5 lines with Sprint. Only one has the 10 added to it. So once the rest of the lines upgrade, it puts me at 243. AT&T is cheaper than that for what I need. Once my contract is up, there is no way I'd pay more for Sprint and their failing 4g network than AT&T who has the money to keep building their network. Sprint has stated that they could go to LTE if they wanted to, so why in the world wouldn't they? Everyone else is and its clearly a better network, so why wait? Even their Wimax network is garbage where they do have it. The 4 cities I have been to that have 4g has no more than 1 or 2 bars and in and out service all the time. This is the way it is after Clearwire is out of money? How can you expect them to distribute to other cities and suburbs with no money and when the cities that do have it don't even have a very good signal? Not looking good for Sprint.

[greggebhardt]

A lot of wishful thinking here. I hope it is all true.

The biggest question is always WHEN!