Following its deal with Sprint in December and subsequent raising of capital, clwr is out in the market again – this time looking to sell $300M in debt. And as a part of doing so, the company has pre-announced some unaudited Q4 numbers for us to look at.
Revenues of $362M were a bit above expectations, as net wholesale subscribers jumped by another 900K and wholesale revenues jumped 20% above third quarter levels. They finish 2012 with 9.1M wholesale and 1.3M retail subscribers. But the key number Clearwire reported today was not a number, but rather its sign. Adjusted EBITDA for Q4 was ‘positive’, which is a major milestone for Clearwire’s cost-cutting drive and a big improvement from the third quarter’s $-46.4M.
The additional $300M or so in debt financing will, if successful, be added to the $716M in net new capital the company raised back in December, giving them about $1B to make the transition to LTE in 2012. Both Clearwire and Sprint Nextel (NYSE:S, news, filings) plan to be busy this year with LTE, likely working in a complementary way to get there as quickly as possible so as to not let Verizon and AT&T run away with the 4G market.
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Categories: Financials · Wireless
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If the govt has blocked 4 wireless players form becoming 3 and you have the amount of debt Sprint has without the growth needed to grow out of it – what will happen?
I have long said that Sprint wireline needs to go before it is too late but the market is telling you that even something north of my estimate of wireline value isn’t enough. What are Sprint’s real options?
Is an acquisition by CTL the only hope Sprint has?
Anyone have any thoughts here?
Investment from Dish via cash/spectrum would be a start.
If I were Sprint, I would stay the course of what they’re on now. Customer counts have turned. Perhaps an absorption of LightSquared, bringing along capital, and reducing the terrestrial component of the LightSquared network.