Sprint loses more customers, 5000 employees

After a week full of fourth-quarter financial warning from vendors, Sprint may have provided the culminating piece of negative news with a revised fourth-quarter outlook in which Sprint CEO Gary Forsee said the company lost 306,000 of its post-paid customers during the quarter. Forsee also said the carrier will eliminate 5000 jobs, the majority of which will be gone by April 1.

Despite reporting subscriber additions during the quarter from its wholesale efforts and affiliates that amounted to more than 875,000, and additions from Boost Mobile that cleared 171,000, Sprint reported only 700,000 or so net additions for the quarter. Those net adds are a large number than the 233,000 net adds Sprint reported for the third quarter last year, but the fourth quarter’s net loss of postpaid customers also is far larger than the previous quarter’s 188,000.

“We’re seeing divergent results, with growth in CDMA subscribers, but lower demand for iDEN services,” said Forsee on the Monday night call with the investment community. “We fell short of the operating results we envisioned for our first full year as a combined company.”

Nevertheless, Forsee said Sprint will continue to invest, building 4800 new cell sites over the next year, and beginning the deployment of its recently announced WiMAX network upgrade with vendors Motorola, Samsung and Nokia. Forsee also said the company will conduct a review of advertising agencies during the first quarter this year that could result in better marketing and advertising.

The 5000 lay-offs will bring Sprint total employee base down to 59,600.