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YAHOO’s stock plunged nearly 15% Monday. Major shareholders are furious with CEO Jerry Yang, whom they believe was bias against selling the company he co-founded in 1995. With majority stockholders angry and Yang still open to a deal with Microsoft, expect talks to continue in the near future.
SPRINT may spin off or sell NEXTEL. Since acquiring Nextel three years ago for $35 billion, Sprint has continued to lag behind industry leaders VERIZON and AT&T. Ending its relationship with Nextel, which has been a failure from the beginning, could make Sprint more attractive to DEUTSCHE TELEKOM.
GOOGLE is asking the FCC to obtain a pledge from VERIZON that it will uphold its open source agreement on the 700MHz of wireless spectrum. Verizon has fought the open source condition, filing a law suit last fall (since dropped), which would allow consumers to use third party devices on Verizon’s C-block spectrum. If agreed upon, Verizon could not sell locked wireless devices to consumers for use on the newly acquired spectrum.
T-MOBILE has launched 3G phone service in New York. The mobile provider, which until recently didn’t have access to the 3G radio spectrum, is playing catchup other providers, but hopes that its foray into next generation service will help boost its number 4 status in America. One major problem, T-Mobile won’t be introducing any BlackBerry smart phones, let alone iPhone’s, compatible with it’s 3G spectrum until sometime next year.
MICROSOFT has fine tuned its ZUNE player to compete with APPLE’s iPod. The Zune received a software update that will allow users to share files via the Zune card, as well as download TV shows from NBC. While innovative sharing options make the Zune more attractive, don’t expect anyone to be trading in their iPod anytime soon.