Dan Hesse

Sprint Nextel Corp.'s chief executive said Thursday that consolidation in the wireless industry may be coming but it will be difficult.

Speaking to analysts in New York, CEO Dan Hesse said he doesn't comment on "media speculation" after U.K.'s Sunday Daily Telegraph reported that Deutsche Telekom AG, the parent of T-Mobile USA, was considering a bid to buy Sprint, the third-largest U.S. wireless provider.

The rumors have since cooled with reports saying a bid isn't imminent.

On the heels of Verizon's data packages for feature phones, Sprint Nextel is rolling out a new pricing model with unlimited mobile-to-mobile calling from the Sprint network to any wireless phone on any U.S. wireless carrier network at any time.

Sprint Nextel is pushing the green envelope this summer with the introduction of the Samsung Reclaim, an eco-friendly phone with plenty of high-tech bells and whistles. Made from 80 percent recyclable materials, Samsung Reclaim is a messaging phone aimed at environmentally conscious customers who don't want to sacrifice multimedia features and modern form factors.

It certainly didn't take long for a few storm clouds to appear over the otherwise glittering launch of the Palm Pre. At a press conference Friday, Sprint Nextel CEO Dan Hesse took issue with media suggestions that the much-anticipated smartphone would be available from Verizon Wireless in six months or so.

"They need to check their facts," Hesse said. "That just is not the case. Both Palm and Sprint have agreed not to discuss the length of the exclusivity deal. But I can tell you it's not six months."

Sprint Nextel expects strong Palm Pre sales when it debuts on June 6, so much that CEO Dan Hesse has warned investors that there may be shortages.

"We don't intend to advertise it heavily early on because we think we are going to have shortages for a while," Hesse said. "We won't be able to keep up with demand for the device in the early period of time."

Sprint Nextel posted a $594 million loss in the first quarter -- substantially higher than the $505 million loss the nation's third-largest wireless carrier recorded in the final three months of 2008. The company also said revenue fell 12 percent to $8.2 billion.

Sprint Nextel Corp., the nation's third-largest wireless service provider, on Monday reported a larger first-quarter loss on declining revenue and a charge for job cuts announced in January.

But its adjusted results narrowly beat estimates and its shares climbed 14 percent in morning trading.

Sprint continued to lose subscribers but far fewer than it did in the last three months of 2008. The improvement, however, reflected a sharp increase in prepaid customers while the number of subscribers who sign up for annual contracts and are more valuable to Sprint fell.

"Economic uncertainty" was the phrase of the day for Sprint Nextel. During a Feb. 19 conference call, executives of the No. 3 U.S. wireless service provider used the two words liberally to describe the company's fourth-quarter results. In the three months ended in December, sales fell, losses ballooned, and customers jumped ship. There was so little visibility into the future that the company declined to make a forecast for the current quarter.

It has been no walk in the park for Dan Hesse, chief executive of Sprint Nextel, who was brought on board more than a year ago. On Thursday, the third-larges U.S. wireless carrier showed it's not immune from the poor economic conditions as it reported huge losses for both its balance sheet and the number of customers.

Sprint has lost more than 1.3 million wireless customers and reported a huge drop in revenues. The company has been losing net customers for nearly two years despite an effort to reverse the decline.

Sprint Nextel on Monday announced plans to lay off about 8,000 employees by the end of the first quarter. The move is expected to reduce labor costs $1.2 billion a year.

The job cuts span all levels of the company in various geographic locations and include about 800 positions Sprint expects to be eliminated under a voluntary separation plan launched late last year. The cuts come at a short-term cost as Sprint said it expects to spend $300 million in the first quarter for severance and related costs.