T-Mobile CEO John Legere said his company is now porting customers over from AT&T, Sprint and Verizon at a rate of 3 to 1.
Speaking at last week’s GeekWire Summit, Legere said that over the last few weeks T-Mobile has seen its porting ratio with AT&T and Verizon go from 2 to 1 to 3 to 1. He added that Sprint has made a “huge in-road” and actually lowered its ratio with T-Mobile from 4 to 1.
Legere didn’t think T-Mobile had yet passed Sprint in total customers but estimated it would by Thanksgiving.
Turning his attention to recent rumors of France’s Iliad as it works to improve its bid for T-Mobile, Legere summed up owner Xavier Niel as a wealthy man with long hair who made his money in “porn” and whose wife is heir to the “Louis Vuitton money.”
“This is clearly somebody who’s trying to raise money because he’s fascinated with T-Mobile,” Legere said.
Legere decried the rumors about Iliad but said that T-Mobile will continue to be subject to these reports as long as they keep growing.
“T-Mobile is a brand. There’s something very strong and valuable going on,” Legere said, adding he will stay focused on continuing to grow and remaining competitive.
“There’ll be more [offers.] There’ll be a lot of interest. And, frankly, over time, there are multiple ways for us to succeed in the industry as a standalone and in various consolidation scenarios.”
Legere said T-Mobile can continue being a very profitable, growing company but admitted that the trick is that T-Mobile is operating within a scale industry. He said that putting T-Mobile and Sprint together would yield immediate scale.
“As long you called it T-Mobile and I ran it, it would be successful,” Legere said.
The rumors around a T-Mobile-Sprint merger that swirled all summer fell apart after Sprint dropped its effort to refocus on competing within the industry. Iliad is rumored to be still pursuing T-Mobile but the French company has also placed a mid-October time limit for either improving or abandoning its bid.