Sprint’s board of directors is reportedly debating whether to let rival U.S. carrier T-Mobile USA invest in Clearwire (NSDQ: CLWR), according to the WSJ, which spoke with three people familiar with the situation.
But in reality Sprint (NYSE: S) has no say in the matter. Despite owning a majority of Clearwire’s shares, it doesn’t have operational control over the company. In addition, T-Mobile has not put a proposal on the table, so it’s unclear whether it is even interested in making an investment. The only thing that Sprint may debate is whether it wants to make an additional investment in Clearwire, or leave it up to another company.
In previous conference calls, Clearwire’s CEO Bill Morrow has explained that Sprint doesn’t control the board. They can appoint seven of the 13 seats, but to take major decisions on the direction of the company it requires a supermajority, or at least 10 of the 13 votes.
In the second-quarter call, Morrow was explicitly clear when it came to the subject of whether Sprint could reject financing from another U.S. carrier: “Let’s just say, the largest arch enemy of our top shareholder [Sprint] kind of came in and said we
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