Less than 24 hours after a new rumor claimed that Sprint was abandoning its effort to acquire T-Mobile and would be replacing its CEO, the big yellow carrier has indeed announced that it’s got itself a new leader.

Sprint revealed this morning that Marcelo Claure will be its next President and CEO effective August 11. Claire joined Sprint’s Board of Directors back in January and also serves as CEO of Brightstar, a firm that distributes wireless products and services.

Claure founded Brightstar in 1997 and is currently 43 years old. He has received an endorsement from Sprint Chairman Masayoshi Son, who described Claure as a “successful entrepreneur” that has the “experience, passion and drive to create the strongest network and offer the best products and services in the wireless industry.”

Marcelo Claure is replacing Dan Hesse, who joined Sprint as CEO in 2007. Once Claure takes Hesse’s place at the helm of Sprint, he will resign his position at Brightstar and SoftBank, Sprint’s parent company, will acquire his interest in the firm.

Sprint has hit a few bumps recently, rolling out a WiMAX network and then switching to LTE and recently abandoning its effort to acquire T-Mobile. Now with new ownership in SoftBank and a new CEO, it’ll be interesting to see how Sprint plans to take the fight to AT&T, Verizon and a reinvigorated T-Mobile.

What do you think Marcel Claure can do to make Sprint more competitive in the U.S. wireless market?

Via Sprint