Dish Networks’ site for taking early registrations for the Boost Infinite postpaid service, which launches later this year, is now live.
This latest move by Dish was first reported by Bloomberg.
The service will be nationwide, using the networks of Dish, AT&T and T-Mobile, a Dish spokesperson told Fierce.
The website talks about “the power of three 5G networks” and shows the U.S. in separate blue, magenta and red colors but doesn’t name the operators behind the networks.
Of course, Dish doesn’t yet have its own nationwide 5G network. It just announced hitting its 20% milestone in June. It first launched its 5G network starting in Las Vegas in May and then expanded service to more than 120 cities across the country.
Through the government’s remedy in the Sprint/T-Mobile merger, T-Mobile was required to divest Sprint’s Boost and other prepaid brands; Dish closed on the $1.6 billion deal on July 1, 2020.
Dish's Boost initially used only T-Mobile’s network but the shutdown of Sprint’s legacy CDMA network triggered a major dispute between Dish and its MVNO partner. Last year, Dish signed a second MVNO deal with AT&T, and more recently, it announced better terms with T-Mobile in a renegotiated MVNO pact.
CNET noted that Dish will continue working on its own Project Genesis product, which is separate from Boost Infinite. A company spokesperson told CNET that Project Genesis will remain focused on early adopting customers in select markets “that want to experience the 5G network of the future.”
During Dish’s second-quarter earnings call on Wednesday, Dish EVP of Retail Wireless Stephen Stokols said Boost Infinite is a big focus internally. It’s a more aggressive expansion into postpaid for Dish and gives them the chance to “do things in a slightly different way and a more aggressive way,” he said.
He declined to go into too much detail, saying more will come out on it later in the year, but he did say they’re going to have options that run the gamut in terms of both selling phones across the Android and iOS ecosystems and having BYOD offers.