Sprint Names New Communications Head, Rejigs Management Team

(RTTNews) - Wireless carrier Sprint Corp.'s (S) new Chief Executive Officer Marcelo Claure is rejigging the struggling company's top management team in order to revive its fortunes. Claure was appointed by Chairman Masayoshi Son in August to replace the then CEO Dan Hesse.

The company has now named respected and experienced communications leader Douglas Michelman to ioin its management team as senior vice president of corporate communications and corporate social responsibility.

Michelman will join the company after serving for ten years as the chief communications officer at Visa, Inc. (V). His communications background also includes staff positions for two presidential campaigns.

"Doug brings world-class experience to Sprint. I'm excited about Doug joining my leadership team and believe his background is a tremendous fit for Sprint's journey to reshape the wireless industry. Simple, honest and transparent communication is an integral component in reshaping the wireless industry, " Claure said in a statement.

Michelman replaces Bill White, who will be leaving the company after serving it for the past 32 years. Michelman joins Sprint on December 1, 2014.

Overland Park, Kansas-based Sprint in August replaced Hesse with billionaire Claure, Sprint's director and founder of mobile phone distributor Brightstar Corp. Hesse has headed Sprint since December 2007. SoftBank bought control of Brightstar in January and had put Claure on Sprint's board.

The move to rejig the top management team began following Sprint abandoning its bid to acquire smaller rival wireless provider T-Mobile US, Inc. (TMUS) after it pursued the deal for nearly eight months, as the deal faced tough regulatory hurdles. Since his appointment, Claure has been in the process of having the right people in the right positions as the company continued to reverse its trend of losing money and customers. He recently named more than two dozen executives to make his core leadership team. He also announced two new positions of chief experience officer and chief procurement officer.

Meanwhile, the management rejig also saw a few departures. Three senior Sprint executives, including Chief Marketing Officer Jeff Hallock, left the company.

Earlier in the month, Sprint said it would eliminate about 2,000 more jobs as part of its efforts to reach its target of $1.5 billion of annualized cost reductions. The company had said last month that it would cut an unspecified number of jobs.

The announcement of job cuts came after the company reported that its second quarter loss widened from last year, as the third largest U.S. wireless carrier continued to lose postpaid subscribers.

Sprint, which is more than 80 percent owned by Japan's third-largest mobile carrier Softbank Corp. (SFTBF, SFTBY), lost 272,000 net postpaid subscribers and 500,000 phone customers in the second quarter. Sprint platform net additions were 590,000, mostly driven by strong wholesale net additions. Sprint ended the quarter with 55 million connections.

S closed Monday's regular trading session at $4.91, down $0.14 or 2.77% on a volume of 12.93 million shares.