T-Mobile CEO John Legere appears to be kicking off 2015 very much like he ended 2014 -- and clearly not making any resolutions to cut competitors any sort of slack.
His prime target is still Sprint, but he isn't holding back when it comes to telecom industry leaders AT&T and Verizon, either.
"Sprint will continue throwing out campaigns, offers and promotions -- anything to see if it sticks," writes Legere at his blog. "It'll be confusing as hell. Somewhere midyear, they'll realize they can't slash their way to growth and start to invest in their network and customer care."
Neither Verizon or Sprint returned requests for comment on Legere's latest declarations of market moves ahead.
Legere, who loves to pontificate and loves the outrageous, can do so as the numbers appear to be backing up his assertations regarding who is winning the battle for smartphone and wireless consumers.
One of his biggest predictions, or boasts as some may describe it, was that T-Mobile would overtake Sprint and grab third place before 2014 ended. As the new year dawned the numbers seem to indicate it may have happened.
T-Mobile's 55,018,000 subscribers is just a few thousand subscribers behind the 55,037,000 Sprint reported in September. So it's little surprise Legere's boast is getting a bit louder a week into the new year.
"T-Mobile will -- officially -- become the No. 3 wireless company in America in 2015," he writes at his blog. "This summer, I said we'd blow by Sprint by the end of 2014 to become the No. 3 wireless company in the U.S. They have been swinging the bat since I made that statement, so we won't know where things stand until we get the final score after we both report Q4 earnings, but whether it is now -- or soon -- I'm telling you, it's a done deal!".
But then again it could be too close and too soon to call the battle as Sprint has been running a number of promotions to entice customers to remain with the carrier or join from a competitor. One campaign in particular may be hitting the mark bigtime.
It's looking like the "cut your bill in half" promotion may have been particularly successful. Sprint, through Jan. 15, is offering to cut a new customer's telecom bill in half while still providing unlimited talk, text and data.
And another Legere claim may also play a role in who ultimately gets to call itself the third-largest carrier. The T-Mobile chief says all of Sprint's rapid and random marketing campaigns are confusing customers and make the company appear desperate to consumers -- moves which typically don't instill faith.
Meanwhile, Verizon and AT&T barely gave any attention to what T-Mobile and Sprint had been doing last year, clearly confident about their place as No. 1 and No. 2. But now comes word AT&T is launching a new customer marketing push Jan. 25 and bringing back its "Rollover" program. But instead of minutes, the focus is on data.
Whether that move is in response to T-Mobile and Legere's New Year's blog post is an unknown, as AT&T certainly would never admit it. Legere, for his part, is where he left off as 2014 came to a close -- stirring the pot in his continuing push to knock down Sprint.
"I said we would change wireless for the better and we are," Legere writes. "Revolutionizing this industry has always been about truly reinventing it."
"The other guys will keep trying to fake their way through -- with their eye on their own bottom line -- but we will keep shaking things up and forcing change. Unfortunately, I don't see any real behavior changes coming from the carriers in the year ahead and I'd be missing an opportunity to keep the pressure on them if I didn't remind you of the pathetic efforts these guys have made to keep up with us so far."
