When CEO vet Dan Hesse joined Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) over a year ago, the 20+ year telecom vet probably knew what was in store for him. The third-largest wireless carrier in the U.S. was bleeding subscribers to the competition every quarter, the future of Sprint's 4G high-speed national wireless network was in doubt and the company really did not have a hit product like the iPhone on its shelves.Add that to the ongoing mess with the Nextel brand and Hesse had one large job to face in the corner office. Although many of those issues still exist today in some form, Hesse will be the first to say that Sprint's in it for the long, successful haul. Still, the company is expected from market analysts to post a quarterly loss of $0.02 per share when it reports Q4 numbers later today. Sprint's Hesse seems to indicate that while Sprint is certainly down, it's nowhere near out.
The company has improved its customer service greatly in recent times and is about to launch the Palm Pre, which is widely considered to finally be a true competitor to all the iPhone 3G has to offer (initial reports from the device have been very favorable). Still, Hesse is sure to face quite a few more messy quarters before Sprint really does turn things around and actually starts gaining customers again. One bright note on the subject Hesse recently indicated was this: "We no longer have the highest churn among the big four... we moved ahead of T-Mobile." Sprint needs more of that in 2009.
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