Xohm Brand Gone as Sprint, Clearwire Merge WIMAX Assets

The $14.5 billion Sprint-Clearwire merger officially has closed and the brand name decision-making has begun.

Clearwire Corp. announced on Monday, three days after the final handshakes took place over the long-discussed WiMAX venture, it will toss the “Xohm” brand and replace it with “Clear.”

Sprint Nextel Corp.’s (S) Barry West also has left Sprint – he was CTO and president of the Xohm unit – for Clearwire. He’ll serve as president and chief architect.

Meanwhile, the combined companies will retain the Clearwire name as they work to build a WiMAX network meant to cover 140 million people.

Sprint owns 51 percent of the new venture; Clearwire holds a 22 percent stake. The rest of the company is owned by investors including Comcast Corp., Intel, Time Warner and Google Inc.