Today has given us two fascinating news items for the U.S. Wireless market: Motorola's Ed Zander is stepping down (and has already been replaced, so the company at least has good succession planning), and Sprint's board declined an offer of $5 billion from SK Telecom and a venture fund, but required former chairman Tim Donahue to become CEO. Oh, and the company is still looking for a CEO - no effective succession planning there.

Both of these companies are ailing. Sprint's investors (and hence board members) act risk-averse, which is not a good idea for a company making a major new technology play in WiMax. Further:

• Customer service has been a "top job" for the past 7 years, but the service continues to be abysmal
• Sprint is losing customers left and right (in fact, they've lost three lines of service from us in the past 10 weeks)
• Few people believe that Sprint is an "entertainment company" as they assert; they would like reliable phone service first

I believe nothing less than Sprint's survival as an independent entity is at risk.

Motorola isn't in better shape. Having dropped from number 2 to number 3 in the world, there is no great new design to come save them. They keep repeating past history: come up with a great product, then milk it for a few years making lower and lower price derivatives until there is no more margin. A single great product every 10 years does not a great company make. Even Apple followed up its iPod with something new in less than that time, with the Nano, Shuffle, Video, and that one phone device people are talking about.

These are interesting times.

One theory that doesn't have fear as a driver for the Sprint board refusal: what if there were another deal that precluded accepting this one?

Bonus U.S. news: Giant U.S. retailer Walmart has opened a web-based mobile content store, integrated with its physical stores as well as a short code. I'm imagining standing in front of the physical shelves and seeing "text 5425 to 40888 to get this on your mobile!" This could prove to be an interesting move, if handled well. I imagine it would eventually expand into the enhancing experience in the rest of the store. And yes, Tesco is doing much the same.

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Little Springs Designs the user experience for mobile devices and services. Our practice of user-centered design means the user comes first, not the technology. We learn about the user, design for the user, and talk to the user - but we understand the technology and its limitations and potential.

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