New Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure says new pricing plans are coming soon
.jpg "Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure told employees Thursday, “We’re going to change our plans to make sure they are simple and attractive and make sure every customer in America thinks twice about signing up to a competitor.”")
Sprint’s new CEO, Marcelo Claure, pledged to his headquarters staff Thursday to get the company “back in the game,” starting with price cuts that could begin as early as next week.
According to the telecom industry website Light Reading, Claure told several hundred employees, “We’re going to change our plans to make sure they are simple and attractive and make sure every customer in America thinks twice about signing up to a competitor.”
Besides the “very disruptive” rate plans, he said, Sprint will react quickly to bring competitive offers to potential customers. Claure also said finishing Sprint’s network upgrade and cutting operational costs would be priorities.
Spokeswoman Melinda Tiemeyer said Claure’s first employee “town hall” meeting was standing room only.
“When you have a great network, you don’t have to compete on price,” Claure reportedly said. “When your network is behind, unfortunately you have to compete on value and price.”
Light Reading did not disclose its source from the meeting, closed to outsiders. Its report also said:
Claure acknowledged that job cuts were coming but said he did not yet know how many.
He said he would conduct honest, two-way conversations with his employees. He would give out his direct email address and said he would reply to everyone who wrote.
Sprint’s network upgrade and replacement took too long, he said, and retail employees had had a hard time communicating the value of Framily, Sprint’s family plan.
He pointed out that despite those negatives, Sprint’s spectrum holdings carry a tremendous value, and the company has great employees. He said he was confident Sprint could eventually challenge AT&T Inc. and Verizon Wireless.
Claure said Sprint’s second phase would be to leverage its spectrum and become America’s best network. “I want to make sure we’re the incumbent-challenger,” he said.
This story was originally published August 14, 2014 at 8:28 PM with the headline "New Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure says new pricing plans are coming soon."