The carrier: It's a well-known fact by now that Verizon Wireless is owed the most money by Amp'd: about $33 million. So that puts it on the list of companies most negatively impacted by the MVNO's Chapter 11.
The vendor: One of the biggest losers on the vendor side seems to be Boston Communications Group (BCGI). The company had a lot resting on its deal with Amp'd. According to recent filing with the SEC, BCGI had "a long term contract [with Amp'd] through 2012 and had been included as a key component of BCGI's growth plans for the next five years. In addition, BCGI's has monies due from Amp'd for services performed and other contractual fees of approximately $2.8 million as of the bankruptcy filing date. Lastly, the net book value of BCGI's hardware and software related to the provision of service to Amp'd was approximately $2.0 million as of the filing date."
The investors: The big three include: RedPoint Ventures, Highland Capital Partners and Columbia Capital. Total disclosed VC? $360 million in funding after five rounds. Ouch. The MVNO also owed $16.4 million to Motorola, $10 million to Vivendi, $8 million to BestBuy and $1.8 million to MTV Networks as well lesser amounts to Qualcomm and Brightpoint North America.
The employees: While they knew MVNOs would be a risky business, some of the company's 360 employees--especially the executive--will be dogged by the failed venture. Most notably, CEO Peter Adderton who founded the company and pushed hard to try to make it work. Amp'd president Bill Stone also has a long history of carrier experience, most recently Verizon Wireless. Will this hurt future job prospects? Former T-Mobile USA COO Sue Swenson, who served as COO at Amp'd as well may have some trouble getting over this. She was also president of Leap during its Chapter 11. Swenson, of course, played less of a public role at Amp'd than Stone or Adderton.
The customers: What about the customers? The blogs are asking. Well, there's a good chance Amp'd subs will lose their numbers if they don't port them over quickly enough. Their phones will work for the most part, if they sign up directly with Verizon Wireless. Worse, the young group of ex-Amp'd subscribers have to suffer the I-told-you-so barbs from friends and parents alike who thought switching to some unknown mobile carrier was a bad idea from the start.
For more on the biggest losers:
- read this article about BCGI