OVERLAND PARK, Kan. -- Building on more than 20 years of success in providing communications services to federal agencies, Sprint continues its leadership position by announcing several new and renewed agency contracts valued at more than $500 million. Sprint also has made multiple GSA contract modifications that are expected to help fuel double digit-growth in 2010. Sprint is committed to offering secure, cost-effective and innovative services to meet the mission needs of agencies for a seamless and interoperable environment.

Agencies continue to rely on the depth of Sprint’s wireless portfolio, including the industry-leading push-to-talk service, Nextel Direct Connect^®, for instant communications; mobile broadband data services on America’s most dependable 3G network*; and are eagerly anticipating the blazing fast speeds and dynamic new applications that can be enabled by Sprint 4G, available in 27 markets across the country and scheduled to launch in the Washington, D.C., area in 2010.

Key wireless contract wins in 2009 include:

• Department of the Navy – In September, Sprint received an extended one-year contract with U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps worth up to $20 million for wireless data and voice services, including primarily BlackBerry^® devices and Nextel Direct Connect.
• United States Postal Service – A new contract was awarded to Sprint is expected to produce estimated revenue up to $480 million during the eight-year period it will be in place. This new contract vehicle significantly streamlines and economizes the wireless spend for the U.S. Postal Service and further enables the USPS to continue enjoying the benefits of wireless voice and data services that Sprint products and services provide.
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) - Sprint received a new five-year contract to provide wireless services to NOAA, which is part of the U.S. Department of Commerce. Under this $10 million agreement effective April 1, 2009, Sprint services include Nextel Direct Connect, national and international wireless voice, and Sprint 3G Mobile Broadband devices. Such services provide NOAA employees the speed and flexibility they need to respond quickly to changing conditions and help enable them to work virtually when and where they want.

“2009 was a great year for Sprint as we continued to support our federal customers with innovative, cost-effective, wireless solutions powered by the Now Network for their day-to-day communication needs,” said Bill White, vice president of Federal Programs, Sprint. “We are very excited about the expected 2010 launch of Sprint 4G in Washington, D.C., which will allow agencies to experience mobility services up to 10 times faster than today’s 3G** leading to enhanced experience and productivity.”

Launch of Dedicated Care Team

Sprint recently created a single Dedicated Care team to support all federal civilian and Department of Defense (DoD) agencies. This specialized federal government Dedicated Care team will offer complete life-cycle support to these agencies, including dedicated care, program management, order management, public safety care, premier care inbound/offline agents, retention, and purchase order management for federal customers with one or more lines.

Networx Enterprise enables future services for federal customers

In preparation for the expected 2010 launch of Sprint 4G in Washington, D.C., and the current availability of the service in 27 markets across the country, the service has been added to Sprint’s Networx Enterprise contract. Businesses are already discovering that Sprint 4G is an effective, flexible alternative for Internet connectivity and can both increase productivity and expand their capabilities. Sprint 4G extends the Web experience to meet each person’s moment-to-moment mobile needs by using 4G data cards and routers. In the future, these services will include laptop solutions and mobile phones that deliver rich content, larger file transfers, streaming video and low-latency remote access.

In addition, Sprint Mobile Integration has been added to the Networx Enterprise contract. Mobile Integration is a unique solution that enables users to fully integrate their mobile phones with the unified communications environment, extending desktop phone capabilities to mobile phones.

In 2009, Sprint was awarded Managed Trusted IP Services (MTIPS) from the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA), so agencies can benefit from Sprint’s global IP network and managed services expertise to deploy the appropriate MTIPS solution to minimize risk and threats to federal information systems. MTIPS is a modification to the Networx Enterprise contract that allows federal agencies to order IP services that comply with Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Memorandum 08-05 issued Nov. 20, 2007. The OMB action calls for implementation of Trusted Internet Connection (TIC) mandate, which required agencies to reduce the number of connections to the public Internet and provide secure IP portals for agency traffic to and from the public Internet.

Additions to the GSA schedule include NextMail and NextMail Locator. NextMail enables mobile workers to “push, speak, send” a recorded voice message to up to 50 e-mail addresses, even if the recipients are not Nextel Direct Connect subscribers, with a just the push of a button. NextMail allows users to open tickets, send in sales leads, close out jobs, meet industry reporting requirements, document breakages and problems at customer sites, schedule appointments or just record self-reminders. NextMail’s customizable subject lines enable recipients to prioritize inbound voice communications, allowing for critical issues to be handled first.

For users with compatible phones, NextMail Locator gives mobile teams access to location-based information to enhance their NextMail messaging, including GPS coordinates, location time stamp, physical street address and an interactive map of their position. The interactive map allows recipients to see an aerial view of the sender’s location, a hybrid view showing the names of roads and streets surrounding the sender, and a bird’s eye view that provides a direct “snapshot” of the physical location of the sender. NextMail Locator provides verification of field service events, exceptions and deliveries.

Sprint serves its federal customers through its newly formed Business Markets Group (BMG). Composed of sales, support, marketing and operations personnel, Sprint’s BMG is dedicated solely to enterprise, general business and public sector customers. BMG delivers wireless, wireline and converged solutions for companies, drawing on the nation’s most dependable 3G mobile broadband network, 4G capabilities that are well ahead of Sprint’s competition, the fastest national push-to-talk network,*** and a comprehensive solutions portfolio of devices and applications.