Cricket Wireless 2011 Annual Report Download - page 5

Launched in January 2011, Muve Music is
the first digital music experience designed
specifically for the mobile phone – and the
only service to include unlimited full-song
downloads, ringtones and ringback tones in a
wireless rate plan for one monthly fee.
VALUE INNOVATION
Customers count on Cricket to bring two things together: value and innovation. Unlike postpaid carriers,
we earn our customers’ business every month. People come to us because we offer the right products,
the right devices and the right coverage. They stay because we deliver industry-leading value.
We innovate value better than any other prepaid carrier, and Muve Music is just the latest example.
Launched in January 2011, Muve Music is the first digital music experience designed specifically for the
mobile phone – and the only service to include unlimited full-song downloads, ringtones and ringback
tones in a wireless rate plan for one monthly fee. Until now, the digital music world was built around a
computer and a credit card. With Muve Music, we have created a complete music experience for a new
market: customers whose lives revolve around a mobile phone and cash as a form of payment.
As the lead product in our national retail expansion, Muve Music continues to be a key differentiator
for Cricket. Its customer usage and engagement metrics are off the charts. Muve Music customers
download an average of 300 songs per month and listen to music on their phones approximately 40
hours per month. With the highest customer satisfaction of any new product in company history, Muve
Music is attracting new customers who might not have considered Cricket before. Best of all, our latest
innovation is moving Cricket’s business metrics in meaningful ways and is a key contributor to higher
customer lifetime value.
Unlike traditional streaming music services, Muve Music’s patent-pending technology enables a highly
efficient media delivery and storage system. This unique approach saves both the carrier and the
customer network bandwidth and costs. In 2012, we expect to explore potential opportunities to
partner with carriers outside the United States and expand the distribution of Muve internationally.
Another example of how we innovate value is the thoughtful way we are transitioning to 4G LTE
technology. We expect to transition our networks in a prudent, multi-year rollout designed to minimize
capital expenditures. Last December we launched LTE in our first market, Tucson, Arizona, and in 2012 we
plan to launch 4G networks covering up to 25 million potential customers (POPs), or roughly a quarter
of our current network footprint. Over the next two to three years, we expect to deploy LTE technology
across about two-thirds of our network footprint.
At the same time, we continue to reap significant benefits from our 3G infrastructure investment,
which has supported strong smartphone adoption, the demand for high-speed data services and the
popularity of our Muve Music service. We are timing our technology transition to take full advantage
of the current 3G wave while letting the 4G ecosystem mature, giving us a more abundant choice of
better-priced devices, including smartphones and tablets.