>> charlie: wcome to the broaast. tonighthe l.l. doctorow, thinks huh novel "hor and langley." >> you live in the sentences, you don't have a thought beyond that. just trying to make the tng work. and what i've fnd about this book is that the conversati betweenhese two brothers is a li-long conversation. they don't always agree and hor has general forbearance for some o lagley's success. but there is aconversation going on. if two people traveling down a rd except their housebound

mr. ess. the roadis coming thugh them. >> charlie: a cversation about the future about wireless and smart phones and l of those devic and 4with the c.o. of pnt nextel daniel hesse. >> the speed thate're going, we've been behind that. and now allof a sudden we're moving a speed we're hitting that point, we're not ly wireless devices, but what i was describing earlier notjust the phone any morelmost everything is going t be connect wire wirelessly doctor doctorow a hesse coming up.

captning sponsored by rose communications from ourtudios in new york city, this is charlie se. >> charlie: the great.l. doctorow is re. his novels he won a national ok award two, national book credit i c circle ards and the penn faulkner award. many have been best sellers including "rag time" with his latest efforhe retns to a favorite setting, new york in the early 20t ceury. account orecluses whoill their townuses with decades of newspapers and foundhings. i am pleed to have him back. >> thank y. >> charlie: beyon writing

novels you still teach at nyu? >> yes, do. >> charlie: the chair? >> yes. charlie: how my classes do y teach? >> well, i teach one course called "the craft of ficti" a reading course for writers going through books and sing how they work breakinghem down, derstanding tir composition. >> charlie: you've been president -- y've met presiden oma, gave a littl reading list befe he wen on vacation, you were one o his favorite >> yes. i was very pleased to ar that. i would have voted for him- >> charlie: even if he't read your books. >> that's right. >> charlie: what was he goi to read? >>i don't know exactl he may hav been talking about "the marc the -- sheer machine's campaign. >> charlie: we talkbout that fur an hour here on ts prram. >>we d. >> charlie: o you needeal fe characters to fashion your novels >> no, i don't. not at all. st sort of -- that old --

>> charlie: sherman was one. >> it started wh "rag time" quite byccident. >> charl: started with "rag ti?" yeah. at the time people wer quite shocked i wassing historical characters. of course writers have aays done thi napoon is a character in "r anpeace" and of course shakespeare used juliu caesar an a lot of oer peop, richard iii. >> crlie: henry v. on a on. >> now it's n such a shocking thing. >> chaie: let's start with two thin. first of a the dedicion. >> that's right. >> charlie: greatditor of our time. yes, indeed. this is w the bk starts. "i'm hom, the blind brother." >> that's the line that t me writing the book. i wrote that line down e morning, i dn't quite understand i then i realized that thisate

interest i had inthe collier brothersad just popped up -- >> charlie: latent interest? yes. i knew aboutthem as a boy. when they di it was a big news stor they became instant folklore these recluses o collected things more than mo of us collecthings. >> charlie: tell us about them fst. then wll get to e first line. what w the true story of the coier brothers? >> well, the true story was that they came from veryood family. they opted o, somewhere along the line after their parents died they went to the house, closed t doors and the utters and decided to liv by themsees without any true conntion with the outside wod. they dessed the utilities and the utiliti -- theity and

thhealth department and they were embattled for many ars. theyidn't pay their bills. the electric tritee wa cut o. the war was cut off. they were a ltle bit paranoid and e of them was physically lpless, dependent on the other. what happened was that ngley tookll of his junknd bails of paper andtuff and eated traps and snarefor presumed interlopers an prowlers. but he fl down and somehow tripped wire, onef these things, the junk collapsed and killed him. and homer, w was waing arnd for help, never got it, he died of starvation. lice when they finally moved in they coun't get throug the door, they had to drill aole through the roof to enter the housend tonof refuse and thingsere dispotioned of and

they had no relates. after they weruried the city tore the hse down, de a little park on 128th street and 5th anue. lled the collier brotrs parkwhich some of the neighbors 50 years later objected to. >> charlie: this happened wh? >> diet in the late '40s. >> charlie: 1947 i think. >> of course, insta folore, th were instant legends. and i wasn't the only teenage boy whose motherooked in h ro said, my god, it'sthe collier brhers. >> charlie: and so -- what iggered you to write this? well, i wrote this line >> charlie: i'm homer blind brother. >> i reazed that this is something always intereste me. as a matter of fact there e seeds of this book in earlier books in agtime" the littl boy who is a the center of the story isaid to valuehings

discarded other people. d in lly bath, i have a character namegarbage who an ohan boy whocollects stuff on thestreets and lives in a cellar of a house with all thes refuse. somehow this idea has always appealedo me as meaningful. it was the idea of the collier brotrs that inrested me. >>harlie: you're inrested in an idea that came from the >> exactly. thepoint is, theyave two exisnces, the cliers, the historic and myti can existence. so of like abraham linln only less exalted. thmyth i can ex isans interested me andhen you're dealing with myt you don't have to do researc saw don't have t worry aut the details. charlie: but here is what i don't understand. i don't understand y you're t curious to do that.

i know you d't needo do that, but is it counter productive to kn too much? >> absolutely. ve known many writers who researched things exhaustively and stopped in tir tracks, they couldn't condition. you cat know too much if you use your imagination. you write to find out what you are writing. that is the process in ficti wring. >> charlie: you write to find out what you're writing. >> exactly s >> charlie: you onc said to me, writing a procs of discovery. >> y. you n't feel possessive real estate but what you'n.úyou're sr and the reader. you lay down a ntence and you read it d just wi thesame surpse or interest that t reader wl have. >>harlie: the sennce "i'm mer the blind brother"hat s the significancthat have? >> it was just tremendously evocative. and i realized that he was a myth tha dended

interpretation. d i thought of the book asan active ever breaking and enteri, getting ino their house andmind a imagination. >> charlie: that's jt simply in to your mind because you don't know whatas in their mind you're just imagininghem based limit amount of informatn. >> well, tre was limed amount of information available, actually, ere's not much to say about pele like this. you wder why they areike that. and -- >> charlie that's thetory y are they like that? >> y. primarily -- before l the junk was collted they opted out. they chose thisuestion. >> charlie: why would someone look inward instead of out? >> well, seemed to me that the had to be a certain despair invoed. that's why i have langleyoming me from world war i having been gasse and bei general grim abo thnature of the human race. all the millions of people

killed and destroyed in rd war ii. and homer as ablind young man gradually comingto realiz very gradually thate has a sability because what portray is his hearing, which is ry acute. he's very prd of it. and 's compensatory. and while he has that hearg he doesn't feel dibled at all. see them as comingn to the hoe and trying to eate meaning for their lives and making itensible. anthis happens in various ways. for inance, langley takes to collect can the dail newspapers. all of them inhose days ty re seven or eight major day lease in n york. and he's collecting them and the questions, why. and what i propose that he's decided to do a research as kind an aggregat like google and

come up with a seem nill acts of behavior o human beings and jor news stories. and eventually by this rearch toreate one newspaper f all time. an edition tt has to be out of date. coiers one edition for all time newspaper. it's kindf a grimronic idea he has, perhaps notntirely rious. but does kp him busy. >> charlie: yoare a -- your collier brothers are more interesting than the real coier brothers. >> should hope so. >> charlie:. >> charlie: re they nicer? >>ust as shakeeare to come upith richard the iii -- >> charlie: to make a comparison among writers. >> another writer, just a shes mere -- >> charl: another wrer whstole from real life. >> shakespeare' richard iii i mo interesting than the real richard iii. you know there's a society in

england caed the richard the iii ciety. trying to reue his reputation from the remnts of shakesare's pla >> charlie: excellent. >>hat's right. that he wasn't a distorted serial murrer. he was a od, kind king who tried to help his peoe. that i their position. which is more interesting? that's probably the most popar play that shakespeare ever wrote. >> charlie: is it really? i would have thought "hamlet" would be. >>"richard the iii" is instructive the natureof theetf ople to be more than oer people. to have power. to exprs yourself without limit. it's very instructive py. and 's been very useful to people, over the centuries tt stuc in people's nds. >> charlie: what do you think

you're doing? >> wel i don't know. what you do is y write these books and yo live in them, you live in sentences, you don't have any thoht beyo that. you are just trying to make the thing work. what i have found about this book is that the conversatio between thes two brothers is fe long conversation they don't always agree, homer has forbearanceor some of langley's excess. but there is a conversation going onas if they are two people traveling down a roa except their housebound more or less. sohe road was coming thrgh them. and the world is cing in to that hous because people w't le them alone. and whe they do wand around, they 'tractpeople. there's one episode in whh th are so badl dressed with long weaand unkempt grooming

th attract some hippies in central park who come home wh them. anin this way, justne of the waysn which the world intrus in their house and so it's a road nove >> charlie: a majority o people are hoarders, don't you think? aggregator hoarders? >> everye -- >> collectors. absolutely. in a sense ihink of them not as -- i hate be expression pack rats, ithink of them as aggregators, as rators of the life and times. but not as pack rats. i think of them as creatg a museum of american life right in that house. >> charlie: you had to have reason there for the mythical newspape >> colers one edition of a time. >> charlie: that wa his reason for hrding. you gaveim a reason for

hoarding. >> but homer wonders how serious is. d it wasn'tust newspapers of course. he built, broht in pcesf a modet ford set them up inhe dining room. >> exactly >> then tried to use the eine to generate electricity so he didn't have t work with c ison. th do have tirdventures. it's n a quiet life. it very aive lif >> chaie: why do you wte? >> why do i write? because i'm good a it. why doeople do at they do? because there's me connection to se fit, that works for them. why does derek jeter play baball? >> charlie i was just thinng of ted willis once said to me, i said, why baseball? meaning not footbl, not some other sport. he sd, because i was goo at it. >> yeah.

th's true. and he was. he was terrific. >> charlie: s how doou ow you're good? >> you learn that very early age. when teachers begin to tell you that your composions are really good and you should keep writing. or even members of your fily are proudly introducing you to embarrsment to other peopl as "the writer in the familylso, i happen to be nam teredgar alan poe whi was an injution there. children are ned as a wish behi a name, isn't there? my fatherid love th work of edgar alanpoe. actuae liked aot of bad writers, but p wasur greatest bad writer that's m consolation. >> crlie: our greatest bad writer? he is. amazingly good and bad at the same time. charlie: this is silly question but i'm fond o silly questions. uld you rather create the

perfect sort of novelistic coeit of a stor that has grt meaning and tracends and connectsith everybody's life and has power or write a good book that had pfectly constructed sentences? >> why wld you have things like tt? why not take them both andut them together? and just -- >> charlie: in one more important than thether for you? >> well, i don't make divions of that sort in my mind. the bookalways start with se feeling, som evocative start from a phre or picture or phrase of music. something that you find mysteriously excing. and these guys were mysteris to me. they had to be undstood. they h to be interpreted.

but all the books -- this book started with that line, other books have stted, "billy bathgatestarted with, men in black ties standing on a tug b onhe deck o a tug boat. it seemed odd -- >> charlie: havelack ties on a tug boat? >> then it turneout that they were there to take onef their members out in to new york march before and dump him in the water for betrayal he committed to the gang. charlie: that's why they werehere. >> the mine i had that, i had the boyy watchin in the very first paragraph, jumpg on boarjust as the tug boat took off and th started that ok. >> charlie how do you know when you're at the end? >> well, you know you're approaing the end, ateast do, byhe time you ar that far along in the book, you don't have many choes.

erything hasind of an inevitable movement. like arrow getting anyway owe and narrow. then you think, we're cing to e end ofthis, this particul book i wrote the last ragraph and didn't rlize it was the end. then i found i couldt go on any fuher. i sd, oh, that' the end. then so i lookearound for the arest vodka bottle. >> chaie: do you put anything in it or st take it straight? >> put a littl on ice actually. >> charlie: that'she way you celebrate? >> yeah. we, the celebration does go on inne way or another. >> crlie: .l. doctorow "homer and langley" a novel, we'll be right back. ay with us.

>> charlie dan hesse is here the c.e.o. sprint nextel the third largest wireless carrier he has bn a lifetime the telecom busine includi 23 ars at at. his ea to offer a ft fee for cell phone useevolutionized thindustry now ying to turn arou sprint which is lost millions of subscribers in recent years. he has made customers service company central focus and implemented mpler pricing strategies. print's edge and datcould be thkey to its futu, i'm pleased to have him he toalk about this business at all of us are familiarwith. th fute of mobe thnology and 4gll ofthat, welco. >> thanks, chaie, good to be here. >> charlie: l's do a history, a primer r money doesn't ow. just by readg some of your speeches i learned some interesting stuff. ich is, there is one cell phe for every two people in the planet which meanby definition i gus as about 3.3 billion ll ones in existence becae we

have 6.6 billion peopleon the planet. >> we've gone from ro to fou billion almost in 26 years. >> charlie: becomes a illion llars indiana tree 14 point. >> very soon like next yr one of five trillion doar instries. touris food, ao. that's right and wireless. was lookin at stat that said there areten cell pnes produced ten times more cell phones produced each day than babies are bn in the wor. the trajecty is moving u >> charlie: wonder fit has made more new richpeople, whatever the standardis today than any oer busins? you thin about a those countries, wheth it's india, thmiddle east, or asia where theyid not have phones of any kind all of dden, everybody, one out of every two peoe has cell phone. >>t's revolutionized their lives. bere i joined sprint w the board of nokia, the largest

mobile phone proder, but very large in veloping world lik middle east a indi and china where there i rough 50% marketshare. it's just amazing whathe cell phones haveone culrally for many people not onlyhe phone, we might talk about this later, the known becomealmost like swiss army knifen those countries, it's e flashlight. th don't have power ey might live in a tentr shed they can get charged duringthe day they come homit's their light at nit in addition to their communicatn. >> charlie: ty don't even go the land ne business any more, do they? >> no. skipightover it completely. if you look at history o cell phones in 26ears ag people talk about g, whe-- that stands for generations wn people are watching ads on tv they talk abou 3g and 4 gks. 1gas analog that was the beginning. th 2g came alo and 2g was digital you hear acronyms le gsm and cdm that was going text d low speed data. at's the cell phones we

invented in the u.s., had lea actually analog you think killer an was car phones. remember those b heavy expensive things. then gsm came along, cdma in t u.s., and thenit also began to in the fsteneration, wireless w growing rlly organicall second generatio srted to cannibalize. if you remember, i was with at&t, ten years a before digital, with digal typically with each generation you get 5x provement in cost and rformance. so fro 1g to 2g, from a cross elasticity pointf view >> chaie: cost five time-- >> five times basicay for -- u could get fiveimes more capacity in given amount of air the co to send dital was one-fih for a carrier of what it was in analog. allowed rate plans to get tter dital, in second generation, you had thing like digil one rate which y mention thearlier at at&t. ten years ago you went to

airport pay ones as far as the eye can see. and lines. now you c't find o. theye basally gone. pay phone business, calli card business has gon away. talk about otherountries, watches. 73% of cell phone use check their time o their phone notn watch. cameras, nok isargest camera mar in the world. a matter of fact there's mo cell phones th have been produced with cames in them than all cameras ever made, stand alone cameras, digital and film. put that in perective. it's begning to eat i to affect other iustries. about 2g, gone to 3g now.that'. that's really when you get smart phones and the iphone and blackberry andll these really smart oss. d now you have -- >> crlie: opering syems. >> operatingystem, whether it's apple os, palm's os was

revolutionary in thatit duplicated the desktop experience whichis ability to do lti-tasking. and lting the market google's backing which is vy open. lot of these oss are getting much more powerfu microsoft ju launched 6.5 and going to 7.0 windows mobile. the oss are really ming rapidly. the bigame changer, it'sut in 3g, it's also coming outs in 4g to dua me. what are called myfi devices. there's a wirels standard that's been out thereor a long time, it's almost iquitous lled wi-fi. and u have 425, 500 million, whatever t number of devices, active wi-fi devices out i there the s. right now that now can bece mobile th these little puck, is that e like cableodem and wi-fi router in your pocket. that is 3g version. >> crlie: thatwill do what for you? >> allow you to take five devices with youn the road.

it can be your phone, your pc, your net book, your m plar, your gaming device. your camera, camcorder, there all connectedo the internet so you're basicallyot spot is no longer the size o coffee shop or the size of your apartment it's the size of a city or the size of country. so at 3g spes they operate reallyell but at i thi see adoption of these devices. >> charlie: carryou're own wi-fi spot. >> they will carry tm because all of these devices can b mobile. yore going totart to see wi-fi put almosu quick with usually ineverything. anon the phone network. i saw saw stathat supposedly 44of iphone use is over wi-fi. because 's so much faster tn the at&t network whichs ak to eed. you have -- this is wt has been one of the big cnges that

i've seen in the industry, it's been typically ten, 15 years beeen generations 1g to 3g, when they were bein de, spectrum being auctioned years ago like, what are the applicationsyappcationsy do we need 3g. it's barely inhe ground everything is moving t 4g. launching 4g cities -- >> charlie: tell us the difference i 3g and 4g? >> 5x. each generation is basically half oregon order of magtude. the reon i would care, five times the sed, butecause of cost i canet my bket of gigabytes inead of minut, used to be buckeof minutes i the voic world. amount that i can use, you can use about knife times as mh fothe se price as that. at's why i. expeence is more like the home cable modem expeence in terms of speed so is trul like a mobile hot spowhen y get to 4g. see explosion in the nber of -- >> charlie: h many mile devices do you want to carry? >> up to the indidual. what i wan to carry for at

m doing. wh's been happening in the industryas we moveo let's say smart phones which is 3g. is they bece, really becoming swiss army knives. and it's ofourse my watch and myalendar, my e-mail, my camera, my gps it's my computer. but you have to make comprises on each of those to beble to havehem all in one device. what i think we're gng to see is, smart notion will bable to do more d more things that yo hato that smart phone. but wi these hockey pucks you know, i uld like toake digital slr cama take it at 1 megapils but the reason that i have been taking cera versi , i want to upload the pture ght now. but if it's got wi-fi in , so if it has 4g take her ever to take 15 megapixel cera shotshoot it up, share it th somebody on 3g. g like. thatthat's w i care. with 4g allf the other

devices, hh definition mcorders, lger screens if i want t watchtelevision on the row road or download movies. i may not want to carry with it me all the te. but wn i travel,ike a kin dell, ve you exale. a great 3d devi. not something i ca carry. >>charlie: how many things do you take with you? >> i he average of five different cell phones in my briefcase at any one time. >> charlie: why do you he five different celphones? >> i want to be famiar -- i'm in thexwis. >> charlie you want tonow what iphones,lackberry is doin sprint doing, verizon is doing,hat at? >> i want knowhat all sprint devices are. all of our different models. so we have reclaim which is is een environmental phone the blackbey tour. the palm p. geing ready to laun new android devices. i want to be good -- >> charlie: andid being google. >> it is an operating system.

it is -- >> charlie: google uses it? >> google spsored the devepment of android. when y see o phones itwill say, you'll see the google bnd as well as sprint brand. >> charlie: you are big believer in partnering, aren' you? >> very much so. actually, our 4g talking about 4ge've done that in partnership thoogle, intel, time warner, comcast and brighthouse. because it's not just thfact that they cabring money, becae part of fing sprint is generati cash flow and taking down the deb these networkshen youuild out 3-bgs 3g and 4g are expensiv i can mitigate theost by havi them share in the invement of building out this 4g nwork they n bring gre things to the ble. >> charlie: hat are the thin that are influencing development the most? >> a lot h to did with price. there is this magic point at 2-300. thessmart phones are $7 40. very eensive. ey're -- >> charl: iphone, i don't mean to use ple as exale. but you n buy iphone now for

$199 >> that's correc charlie: sprin phone for -- >> sprint and at&t pay $600. sell it to you for $200 in exchange for two-year contract. and because it's -- >> charli explain the numbers. ve me that again. spnt being a network. >> when you sig up for what' calledost pay, o parts of the business generay called pre-pay and post-pay. this is one ever the misunderstandings a lot of customers have aroun early termination fees, how come i can't get a newphone, i just -- why can't i get t same price as n customer. it's because the carrierhas subsidized that phone to a large extent tt typically selling it toou for a thir to qrter of wh we pay for it even when we're buying i volume. don't know ectly what -- at&t won't tell mehat they pay for iphone. if you read most of theress, financial press they think ipne cost about $600 sell

them for $0. buso they -- you are ping $400 less than retail. buyou sign up for two-year contract. at&t mes it up over asy payments of blank. but th is reay spurred adoptionuch more beuse if the iphone was $600, everybod wouldn't have on palm pre ithey were $60 >> charlie: wre is the price point th makes a differen? >> we think it aund -- somewhere $2 clearl is magic. $300 is first on su200. each ones a step function. charlie: real massomes belo 200? >> correct. >> chaie: sprint spifically, you first. u've been in the busine a long time. >> don't remind me howld i am. >> charlie: been c.e.o. for how many years n, of sprint? >> a little over year and lf. >> charlie there the this eat storyabout you.

in which you wand to go to work at&t. t at&t wer only hiring people from harvard your sister lived near harva? >> yes. e lived bton. >> charlie she went toee what nd of internsp offers they mad on the bulletin boards or whater they did. at harvard because that's where their audience was. at the tim i just wanted really good summer internshipn my resume. >>harlie: you were at what point in yr academic career? >>irst year outf -- after my first year of bunesschool, i went to business school my mba right out of under grad i had n significt work experience. my resume was raking leaves, cutting lawns. those nds of things. i wanted to hav a maree name onmy rume before i went ou in to the job world. >> charlie: be great t say at&t iernship. >> corre.

i s at cornell. my sister figured, aot of the top schls, smernternships e tougher to get, particularly back then but i tnk still are than full-time job. there aren't nearly as my. she went ove to -- i talked to her about going over to harvard she said, okay, i'll go over there. she went andjust started taking down all the inrmation on summer internships that they were advertising there. she got me a copyof the plication. i sent it tohe recruiter a at&t. he goes,his kid is at cornell. what the heck?&wt's the story h? he was just curious. he pickedp the phonend called me and he asked me about it. i said, yh, i asked my sister tg or to harvard she got this thing. he say i want to meet you. the plane ticket the next day -- >> charlie: not plane ticket come on down for interview. >> at the end of the day they offered me a job that was for

summer internship. >> charlie: you stayed after? >> i bent back to my seconyear of business school. theyave me job off actually at the end of t summer. i interviewed what haveou, at the end of the -- d of my interviews at the end two of years i decided to go back. >> charlie: whawas it abo tecom that interested you >> a combination. i felt telecom industry was going to change. and changignificantly. th industrystructure -- >>harlie: good instinct. >> t other was, at&t. was a great company, extremely invative. peopleorget it was generating wi or three patents a day. they were really, been a company that was changintrying to beco much more marketing oriented i felt i couldake a differce. because theyere going through this mci andsprint and what ha you had already hit the scene ty were just beginning to see competition. they were gogfter these high powered mbas i felt i cou make a difference. the other thing at&t itself hathe went of the sumr i'd like, my dergraduate was

international studied. i'd like a job working internional department they said we d't put new people the. i sa, i'd like to be in the internatiol department. highway first job they came ck said, okay, yore in the international departnt. my mba i finance you're gog toegotiate normal deals with euroan telephone compani. it fit nicely. combination that got me there. >> charlie: the began running vision oft&t? >> it tooke awhile. i was there 23years. back when i was about 37, i was sentoverseas to be the c.e.o. of joint venture company was d at&t equipmt dision. we crewed to have lucent used to beestern electric. which was twork system at&t used to be this huge massive company. then after tha i r interne division then c.e. at at&t wireless which what i did last three years. then ieft in 2000 >> charlie: y goosprint.

a company that was consided one of the three great wireless coanies. vezon, at&t a sprint. >> yes. >> crlie: verizon has t most number customers, ye >> at verizon geck and neck. >> charl: about 90 milon. >> about 80 million. >> chare: where is sprint? >>9. >> charlie: wt was happening toprint? why s it losingustomers? >> ba in '06 and '07 t brand took hits becae some of custom service experiences that the company let happen. the brand really got hit, what i've been focusing on, you mentioned the benning is build that brand back. the number one thing t really fix theustomer experience. i'm very proud ofthe fact that for 18 months in a row now, it takes a lot of wor to do it each month, o customer satisfaction sres have gone up. in008 we were thonly national carrier thaactually had le churn, fewer of our

customers left us than in previous year. what's misuerstood people s, you're losing stomers. it'sot that we'r losg -- we'vdone a lot beer job of keepinthe customers we ha. we've made most improvent, as a matter ofact in the industry inhat. buwhat's been ppening eadily since the merge with nextel bk in 2005,is that we haven't been bnging in new customers. we're bring ink fewer new ones than are leaving our net subscriber number declining. >> charlie: merger with nextel was a baddea? >> in 20/20hindsight, yeah. itas. yes. that the nextel network is grea great for applications. great people. but the synergy, if you will, that peopleelieved were the didn't materialize so tpremium that sprintaid for nextel w too much. e other thing is, this is what you learn in business school, mergerf equals. isn't a good thing.

because in this case we had two headquarters, operang headquarters where a lot o pele doing day-to-da in nsas city. the magement teamas 50-50, the board was0-50. let's take sprt name, brand name let'sse nexl colors llow and black. a lot of that. >> charlie: often you have differentcultures, too. >> very fferent. one the firsthings that i embarqed on when i got to sprint going to one hdquarters one team, one culture. >> charlie: give mehe game plan. you take a company, is is almost a business school lesson. like sint. which is number three you wt -- what's the goal? what's the ambition? first you got to fix the problems. which is you got bra intity, whh is custor satisfaction, which street deciding onho your team s. all those kinds of human resoue questions. once you got that in ace, how do you win? >> i think the economy is, i thk what's old getee quote, you're n that fast how com

you' always at th puck. i skate to where the ck is goin the puck is gng in two spots. one is data. and wn we say data in wireles we mean erything except voice. it's text orv or surng, anything tt's non-voice is da. broad definiti of datahich 3g and 4g. see our- we've worked hard, twork awards for fastest and dependable when you get to data or3g that's where weclaim most tendible andirst 4g. we're skating to leadershipo be the first in 4g to behe first in data. the other area that's growing, almost like bar bell. use sprint bnd around that. we have nextel bnd around productivity. the other big area where the puck is going, is prepaid. there's postaid, which i descbed earlier which is big discount on the phone nd it to you. the other is prepaid whh is, i don't get a discount on the phone, actuay buy month in advance or buy so man minutes, i don't get a bill. i always pay i advance.

it's prepaid. that's generally -- >> charlie: hy is that more atactive? >> no contract. also people don't have credit rating -- post paid, we are the bank. we're sellg you $60 device for $200 your credit rating maers. if you have creditrating or poor credit rati or say, i would just rather that have -- not have hsle of a contct i go prepaid. wi the economic downtu, and prepaid offers getting lot more successful or aggressive. in our case, our prepaidrand is boost. charlie: it's a muc bigger in eure than -- it is. that's why i think even more potential as ilook at the u.s. market. you lo at rest of world you see where customers ar going theirreference, one of the, i thk maybe one of the benefits of the economic downturn people more interested paying cash and taking letredit and having ss of a commitment. our boost brand, which rint ns this past quarter had

$777,000 n ads that any praid carrier had we just announced acquisition o virgin mobile we'r doubling down onrepaid. really data and prepaid e areas at we wt totake disproportionate sre. way wehink we'll get to growth. >> charlie: do you think th theuture with using althgh devices having e wi-fi connect. rather than everything everything in one device. because youhink tha there's so short coming in having everything in one device? correc >> think it's bh. i think thatoth are dving growth. you'll have smarter and smarter deces, the smart phos, you are exactly right. smartphones ar the growth enne of this business in t industry right now. as a matter of fact fprint we call -- dependswhich study you lookt. what classified as smart phone versus a touch phone, touch screen versus a qwrty ose ose a togeer that's twthirds are in that category today from -- >> charlie: is there a

judgment on touch phone as to whether toh phone is the preferred modetoday? >> well, i mean >> charlie: thi iphone. >> fromndustry point of view, th's where the battle is. that's where the groh is. the doside to the carriers, that's where the big subsidi are. it's expensive for us,hose are the most expensive phos for us to sell. those are the ones where estion need to make sure tha the customer sta with us doesn't churn. beuse we're out a lot of money when someby takes smart phone because thosare expensive deces. artphones will get smarternd better andaster. i'm ready looking at4g veions of smartphones. so that will continuto get better. bu i think the a-ha that has been almost the guy already track, is that they have been, a swiss army knifeith more things on them. this notion of hang this hock puck and the specialized devicealso being able toake them having it all on one account. not having toave each one coected. depending ich i'm doing i c

ta which one withme. >> charl: ease of access and simplicity. >> yes. charlie: is a driving motivation. for consumers. >> yesharlie: if you can make it simpler, if y can put it on plan, one bill, one way to use it, more likely to get customer. >> it's more than tt. customer will pay premium for sim police fee. simplicity is everythi. you mentn iphone. the thing that steve jobs did with the ipode just mad it really simple whe it took off. digital on rate. ich we launched bac in at at was all about simplicity used to be, if was making local call in myon it was this, local call traveling itfuls all these dierent rates. simple, took off, people id more, wn't comprise cut. readnow which we offer in our stores now which is e smart phone so complex, 'll do one on one with you. we think that will bring goodwill. we just announced any mobileany timeon't have to think abut

i'm'm calling you, are youon verin? it's all about simplicit i couldn't agree more. it's making these compl devices, tse swiss army knives really simple. teaching peoe how tose them. and rate pls that i don't have to worry about meter runnini t the same bill. that drives calls wn to customer car that'sig cost in our industry is our calls to care. wh i talked about impving customer service, part of it was to keep cusmers. big piece s toake our costs down. we've clod 19 call centers in the last 12 months. and we're answering thehonates faster tn we did a year ago. because 're removinthe asons for customers to call. one of the big os is, what's this extra charge for this text message or whever. we try to include that. >> charlie: thing you announced is any what? >> any mobil any time. basically what it means, this industry probably a these calling circl. verizon customer, it's not extra charge i'm not billed fo it on verizon or if you're a my favs i can call these five nbers

unlimite this just says, ca any mobile knock yourself auto out f. you're on any of our -- anything da plans unlimited tex and data machines which art at $70 a no. you e calling any mile whher y're calling at&t, t-mobile don't worry. charlie: palmpre how does one go aboutaying i'm going to challenge t iphon i'm going to tak i on. as wells blackberry. >> it was a palm' decision to ke on apple. pa has had long standing relationsh with sprint. when i saw pho early as did our guys we sai this is a great device. we're going to put a lot of weight -- >>harlie: do you win oroe deper los? >> it has i am pact but it doesn't determine whether win lose. very important. if you look at almostany sprint adf there's phone in it it's the palm pre our exclusive phone, our flagshiphone. >> charlie is it making a dent in to the iphone market? >> it'soingell. but u've got to almost p

iphone to be separat category. apple brand has done so well. like comparing someo to michael rdan. >> charlie when you think of al this this open date. >> ery chrome which is more ared to open sysm. are we oking -- are we looking at operating systems which instar net will play increasingly? e pivotal role? >> absolutely. th's really wt 4g is going to be al about. voice just becomes alication. whate did about a yr ago is we opened all of our phones to what's callefull html browsing. there's no more --o anywhere you want on our pnes. i have windows bile download skypon the phone. knock yourself out, go fo it. we're as opeas cane. alsoelps attractevelopers because if they develo applation for internet you want to ma very ey forthem

to port it over toour phone. nohave to go through lot of extra work open isn our best ierests. also number three- >> charli also more gives potential -- our best inrest, too, the duster. >> absolutely.charli all the applications might te place becausef tha >> y. >> charlie: finally, thisyou use ts example, too, all of this exces me. use camell of sales tax of a guy can be sitting -- more busiss, he can be sitting at some tn where he's making a les pitch. he knows that he needs a video from somewhere else. that he didn't bring with him. he doesn't have to call the office say, it will be here tomorrow. he can call back itill be sen wireless to his phone or his devi. >> yes. >> charlie: nstantly, he can say look, i want to sw you th demonstration that we have which didn't realize would come up but here it is. >> and business produivity that's coming from weless, it's helping u.s. competitiveness pretty substantial. bu wh that, wn -- that's

why broadban matters becse you're talki about a power point presention, text i used in was in 4g, if i was in 2g org wting along time been f they had l of graphics, power pnt, 4g, you n actually do than another fly. >> charlie: are we up to seed with the rest the world in terms of speed an broadnd? >> 1we were number one with 2g advantage europe which is -- wi 3g advantage asia. 4g, u.s. back in the dver's seat. >> charlie do people in europe and asia agree with that? >> i think they would. we're going to ha the first rge major 4g nwork in the world re. >> charlie: give -- l ground work finay for where the great -- whever the great questions wh respect to telecom. whatre the -- whe is the battle going to oined? in terms much the future and in terms of compani and products. >> well, i think wirels ha

such anopportunity for growth gog forward. one of the issues, i think obama administration is focusingon the wireless industry. which s its pluses an minuses. in termsf first of allhey realize it's importance tohe country. it'smportance to the nation. oductivity, the number of jobs thatre created, what have you. the downside, ifyou're a businessguy yo don'tant extraegulations,ither. fr a structul persctive they have qstions. you havehis robust wireless instry. in the u.s you have at&t an verizon who ar not onlyy far largt wireless companies, but they're still vertically integrated. talked about at&t the old bell system system, the was a local monopoly. ey still have those in those old territorie and sof we're sprint or t-mobile we want to connect our wirelessetwork in those areas, 's really, really expensive they charge us a lot. the land line monopoly division

which is a competitive pediment to growing the indust further. thers some regatory issues. i think there's some other concerns in the industry and regulation around eay termination fees. why can't we letustomers break their conacts. if you tak those away and phone prices will go up, i belve invation will come down. this adoption, this rapid adopon of new devices and new phes because people buy them because they're very affordable it's because theye subsidized. if you were going to stay with the same carrie for a year two yoll get a betr dea than iyou pay the full price for a phone have the flexibility of leaving. i think the other kind of area that are goingo grow in wirelessis just at vy high leaft think aboutit, long distanceetworks and telecom industry are gng to be wired and continue to that. what we call ddle distance, theity is going to be mobile.

what wethink of as -- what we're talkg about our business then also s the home or prise become increasingly wireless and seehe american are those iustry. that's the notion of wi-fi and wi-fi routers, your c will have a weless chip becau it's going to be not onl for entertainment but monitoring. healthcare y'll have wireless pills you take tha measure wha chemicals you have in yo stomach or wireless chips in yourlothesthat measure your artbeat. >> charl: this is within the next ten years or fivez. >> probly five. machine to machine. kindle is aneme. your appliances will send information to your servero tell you whether iteeds repair or what is in the refrigerator. the areas of growthnd what it will mean terms of cro instry almost goingo -- hard to fathom. >> charlie: it's the most

exciting time in the htory of telecom butf digital technolo. >> i think so. i've bin the industry a long time. and th generatio, the speed with which we're going from 3g to 4g, we've been bind the law. now all of sden we're movin at the speed we're hitting that inflecti point. noonly wiress devices ubiquitous in the world what i was describi earlier notjust the phone. almost everything going to be connected wirelessly. so -- >>harlie: only apply to micro prosers? >> traditionally. in the tech industry it's a term thrown around. actually applies to lot li fiber optics the reall developed at t speed of morse's w as to terms of how much cacity in a fiber. it was doubling every mohs. the biggest impedimt to mobile growth i you got processors a lot faster, screens are getting sharper, they use re and more power and battery chnology is not ving very fast.

lithium ionatteries hit the market in '97 not a lot better. incrementally better but mobil dependupon batteries. even these here devis i've been describing ve to be wered. that's thene breakrough that the indust needs. it needs battery brethroughs? >> chaie: where might it come from? >> i don't know. sor we hope. renewable energy sources. >> charlie: that's ue about rs and everything else. >> ah. i don't kn. >> chaie: thank you f coming. >> arlie, thank you for having me. captioningponsored by se communications captioned by media access group at bh access.wgborg