Sprint today announced it has named Marcelo Claure as President and CEO of the company, who replaces Dan Hesse.
Claure already served on Sprint’s board of directors, and is the Founder and CEO of Brightstar Corp. Sprint owner SoftBank also owns a significant portion of Brightstar, which distributes mobile devices.
Claure will resign from his CEO position at Brightstar effective August 11, and SoftBank will acquire his remaining shares of the company. Dan Hesse will depart Sprint on August 11 after leading the company since 2007. Hesse oversaw many transformations at Sprint, including its acquisition of Clearwire and acquisition by SoftBank.
“I’m proud of the resilience of Sprint’s people during a difficult transformation and I’m optimistic about how they will build on a foundation of innovation to succeed in the future,” said Hesse. “It’s been an honor to have led such dedicated teammates. Marcelo’s entrepreneurial background, business savvy, industry experience and strong relationship with Masayoshi Son make Marcelo an excellent choice to lead Sprint going forward.”
Claure will be based at Sprint headquarters in Overland Park. Claure said he looks forward to leading “the Sprint team as we mobilize to become the wireless carrier of choice in the U.S. In the short-term, we will focus on becoming extremely cost efficient and competing aggressively in the marketplace. While consolidating makes sense in the long-term, for now, we will focus on growing and repositioning Sprint.”
Sprint has lost customers to rivals during the last few years and has struggled to launch LTE 4G as quickly as its competitors. Separately, Sprint will cease its efforts to acquire T-Mobile and will forge ahead on its own.
