Well, this didn’t take long. After T-Mobile closed its deal in acquiring MetroPCS, the number four carrier in the United States wasted no time in unifying the two networks. MetroPCS will begin to use both Magenta’s network and GSM handsets on June 12th, according to a recently leaked document. This should come to no one’s surprise considering how T-Mob just launched the Samsung Galaxy Exhibit and the LG Optimus L9, which are both hitting MetroPCS as well. These two devices come with GSM / EDGE and AWS-capable UMTS / HSPA+ radios — sorry no LTE.
As part of the consolidation of both companies, MetroPCS will also begin to sell its own data plans on T-Mobile’s network. Moreover, the prepaid carrier will push T-Mobile’s BYOP (Bring Your Own Phone), which allows customers to bring whatever GSM handset they want to MetroPCS. However, for some reason, the BYOP program keeps out BlackBerry devices.
We’re not sure if this “bring any phone” policy applies to handsets that aren’t unlocked already. It would be cool if MetroPCS unlocked devices for people to use on its network regardless of its carrier branding. We’ll update this with more clarity as the announcement becomes official.
[Phone Arena; via Engadget]