Sprint

Sprint Corporation, commonly referred to as Sprint, is a United States telecommunications holding company that provides wireless services and is also a major global Internet carrier. It is the fourth-largest U.S. wireless network operator as of February 2015, and serves 55.9 million customers as of 2015. In addition to the Sprint brand, the company offers wireless voice, messaging, and broadband services through its various subsidiaries under the Boost Mobile, Virgin Mobile, and Assurance Wireless brands, as well as wholesale access to its wireless networks to mobile virtual network operators. The company is headquartered in Overland Park, Kansas. In July 2013, a majority of the company was purchased by Japanese telecommunications company SoftBank Corporation, although the remaining shares of the company continue to trade on the New York Stock Exchange. Sprint traces its origins to the Brown Telephone Company, which was founded in 1899 to deploy telephone service to the rural area around Abilene, Kansas. In 2006, Sprint exited the local landline telephone business, spinning those assets off into a newly created company named Embarq, which later became a part of CenturyLink. The company continues to be one of the largest long distance providers in the United States. Prior to 2005, the company was also known as the Sprint Corporation, but took the name Sprint Nextel Corporation when it merged with Nextel Communications that year. In 2013, following the shutdown of the Nextel network and concurrent with the acquisition by SoftBank, the company returned to using simply Sprint Corporation. In July 2013, as part of the SoftBank transactions, Sprint acquired the remaining shares of wireless broadband carrier Clearwire Corporation which it did not already own. On August 6, 2014, it was announced that CEO Dan Hesse would be replaced by Marcelo Claure, effective August 11, 2014. Claure is the founder and former CEO of wireless supplier Brightstar. On February 2, 2015, it announced to buy out and co-brand all RadioShack locations, which includes liquidation and Chapter 11 bankruptcy of RadioShack as a company whole, according to the Bloomberg Report.