Company overview. MetroPCS Communications, Inc. was a U.S. prepaid wireless carrier headquartered in Dallas, Texas, founded in 1994 (originally as General Wireless, Inc.) by Roger D. Linquist and Malcolm Lorang. It was publicly traded on the NYSE under the ticker PCS. At the time of the tracked litigation it was an independent operating company; in October 2012 it agreed to merge with Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile USA, a deal completed May 1, 2013, forming T-Mobile US, Inc. (NASDAQ: TMUS). MetroPCS became a wholly owned subsidiary of T-Mobile USA, with MetroPCS shareholders receiving about $1.5 billion cash plus 26% of the combined company; Deutsche Telekom held the remaining 74%. The prepaid brand was later rebranded Metro by T-Mobile (2018).
Products / services. MetroPCS sold no-annual-contract, flat-rate unlimited prepaid wireless service, primarily voice, text, and data. It operated its own facilities-based network (CDMA, later LTE) and was described by its own merger materials as the fifth-largest facilities-based U.S. carrier, with roughly 9.3 million subscribers as of June 30, 2012. It also sold handsets and accessories through company stores and independent retailers. After the merger its network was progressively shut down and customers migrated to T-Mobile's GSM/HSPA+/LTE network.
Patent-litigation posture. The available data show exactly one tracked case, with MetroPCS named only as a defendant and never as a plaintiff — the classic profile of an operating company targeted by an outside patent holder rather than a patent asserter. The single suit was filed in the plaintiff-friendly U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas (Tyler Division).
Notable case. Fenner Investments, Ltd. v. Cellco Partnership d/b/a Verizon Wireless et al. (filed July 6, 2011) named MetroPCS Communications, MetroPCS Wireless, and MetroPCS Texas alongside Verizon Wireless. Plaintiff Fenner asserted U.S. Patent No. 5,561,706 on managing mobile-user access and billing via a personal identification number. The court construed the claims against Fenner in 2013 and entered judgment of non-infringement for Verizon Wireless on August 9, 2013; the Federal Circuit affirmed on February 12, 2015.