Cellphone Consolidation Continues ↦

To no one’s surprise, the big four in the cellphone industry continue to gobble up their competition:

Sprint Nextel Corp. is intensifying its focus on the fast-growing market for prepaid cell phone service with a $483 million deal to buy Virgin Mobile USA Inc.

The deal reinforces this year’s main trend in wireless. The top two carriers, Verizon Wireless and AT&T Inc., are grabbing the more profitable contract customers, while Nos. 3 and 4, Sprint and T-Mobile USA, are left to compete for prepaying customers with smaller upstarts like MetroPCS Communications Inc. and Leap Wireless International Inc.

Of course, the deal must first garner regulatory approval. That won’t be hard.