Dive Brief:

• Sprint is opening its shops within newly co-branded RadioShack stores Friday, the mobile company said Thursday. Sprint’s store-within-store will take up a third of the space inside but as changes are made will become the prominent brand when it comes to signage.

• There are 1,435 such stores nationwide, which more than doubles Sprint's 1,100-store retail footprint.

• There are few hires yet, but when fully staffed the new arrangement is creating 3,500 jobs.

Dive Insight:

It took the bankruptcy process a while to agree to this arrangement, which is a result of Standard General prevailing in the winning bid for RadioShack. Part of that agreement included Standard General mobile affiliate, General Wireless, acquiring 1,743 RadioShack stores. Sprint will occupy most of those locations. 

It’s not clear that this will ultimately save the RadioShack brand; Standard General didn’t manage to acquire that in the auction, and much of its bid consisted of forgiving its loans to the once-iconic retailer. But the move comes at a time when the mobile business in the U.S. is seeing intense competition, and the expansion could be a boon for Sprint.