Cricket

Cricket Wireless has one word to describe the inaugural year of its Muve Music rate plan for wireless customers: success.

In the calendar year since the plan launched in Las Vegas on the Samsung Suede feature phone, Cricket has expanded the unique unlimited phone plan to three Android handsets.

What's more, the carrier signed on more than 500,000 Muve Music unique customers, or about 10 percent of its almost 6-million-person customer base (including broadband customers), and attributes much of its growth to luring in new subscribers interested in the unlimited voice, texting, Web, and music download service.… Read more

Cricket Wireless announced today that it has launched its first LTE market by initiating service in Tucson, Ariz.

The move marks the start of the carrier's transition from 3G CDMA to 4G LTE, a process that will take several years. According to a spokesman for Leap Wireless, Cricket's parent company, the LTE service now covers 90 percent of the Tucson market with additional expansion to Nogales, Ariz., scheduled for 2012.

Beginning today, the carrier will offer two options for LTE service. Though each plan delivers up to 5GB of data per month, people who pay $50 per month … Read more

Even as we lick our lips over Google's upcoming Ice Cream Sandwich update to Android, I'm impressed that even the more modest new Android phones are on board with Gingerbread.

The ZTE Score is one of them. First introduced exclusively through Best Buy, the Score is also Cricket's latest Muve Music phone.… Read more

Samsung may have crushed our CTIA dreams by pulling back on its biggest announcement here at CTIA, but thankfully it still introduced a number of new handsets.

The Samsung Transfix sits on the opposite end of the grandeur spectrum from the Galaxy Nexus we were all anticipating, but it's a good add for budget carrier Cricket. We got a chance to play around with it here at the show.

The Transfix runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread on its 3.2-inch screen. That's a little small for our tastes, or would be if there weren't a slide-out keyboard … Read more

Cricket, wasting no time between Android announcements, unveiled its next smartphone today in the Samsung Transfix.

Running Android 2.3 Gingerbread and featuring a sliding QWERTY keyboard, the Transfix is powered by an 800MHz processor. Other notable specs include a 3.2-inch display and 3.2-megapixel camera, a microSD card slot, and the requisite connectivity package.

While the hardware may not appeal to your typical Android enthusiast, the no-contract $179.99 price point will certainly turn a few heads. The Transfix will join other Android phones on the Cricket network, including the recent ZTE Score and Huawei Ascend II.

The … Read more

Cricket Wireless isn't wasting any more time turning up the volume on its Muve Music service, which adds all-you-can-eat music downloads to its talk, text, and data plan rates.

Almost two weeks after introducing the Samsung Vitality, its first Muve Music smartphone, Cricket is announcing the launch its second Android act, the ZTE Score. But this time Cricket won't be orchestrating the sales; Best Buy will.

In an effort to acquaint a greater audience to the Cricket brand, the prepaid carrier has partnered with national retailer Best Buy to exclusively sell the ZTE Score later this month, as … Read more

Leap Wireless and its Cricket prepaid wireless service are ready to take the national stage.

Starting Sunday, Best Buy will begin selling Cricket in 1,300 stores around the country, and not just within Leap's region.

This marks the first major step for Leap in its effort to turn into a national brand. The company previously operated its network and served customers in select markets as a regional player, but last year signed a reseller agreement with Sprint Nextel to use its network around the country.

The expansion allows Leap to tap into a much wider audience of consumers hungry for more affordable wireless service. But it also puts the company in direct competition with other national players that offer similarly attractive prepaid plans, including T-Mobile USA, Virgin Mobile, and Boost Mobile. These brands are found in both their own stores and at major retailers such as Best Buy as well.

"This was a chance to build national retail into a larger role for us," Leap Chief Executive Doug Hutchinson said in a recent interview with CNET. "I'm looking forward to building that channel."

But with competition already stiff, it's unclear if Leap can keep up. The company is in the midst of turning itself around by focusing more on smartphone customers and truly flat-rate plans, much like fellow regional prepaid provider MetroPCS. But the company is still early in its turnaround, having lost more than 100,000 customers in the last quarter. … Read more

Cricket's Muve Music service may still be largely unknown, but the release of the Samsung Vitality could help turn the tide in favor of the service, which offers unlimited access to music downloads, ringtones, and ringback tones in addition to Cricket's rate for all-inclusive talk, text, and Web.

The candy apple red Vitality, a repurposed Samsung Admire, runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread and has a 3.5-inch touch screen and a 3.2-megapixel camera. Compared with the thick, clumsy, and unremarkable Samsung Suede that headed up Muve Music's launch, the Vitality--which will be available online and in … Read more

Today, Cricket announced the immediate availability of the Samsung Comment, a QWERTY-equipped handset for messaging fiends.

The device features a 2.4-inch QVGA display, a 1.3-megapixel camera, threaded text messaging, and stereo Bluetooth. In addition, the Comment also has a mobile Web browser, an MP3 player, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and comes preloaded with several carrier services, including Cricket Navigator and MyBackup.

The Samsung Comment costs $89.99, but Cricket does not require you to sign a contract. Plans start at $35 for unlimited talk and text and go up to $45 for unlimited talk, text (domestic and … Read more