The all too familiar voice behind the popular Verizon ‘’Can you hear me now?’’ commercials has made a remarkable comeback. After about 5 years since American actor/scriptwriter Paul Marcarelli’s almost 10 year contract with Verizon expired in 2011 he is now the face of Sprint.

Paul in his own words kicked off his new campaign with Sprint by saying “I used to ask if you ‘can hear me now’ with Verizon. Not anymore I’m with Sprint now, because guess what? It’s 2016 and every network is great. In fact Sprint’s reliability is now within 1% of Verizon and Sprint saves you 50% over Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile’s rates.”

View the Sprint commercial below.

This must have been a skintight turn for the brand ambassador considering the number of years he has been with a major rival company.

He disclosed after his contract expired via email that that his contract with Verizon limited his creative and financial opportunities, and forbid him from deliberating his experiences with others.

His endorsement definitely came as a bombshell to the industry and it did coil up dissimilar responses. According to a Verizon spokesman Jeffrey Nelson “Sprint is using our 2002 pitchman because their network is finally catching up to our 2002 network quality,” He further bolstered that ‘’Verizon remains America’s most awarded wireless network ever’’ claiming they have spent millions of dollars improving the network.

Sprint on the other hand later squawks in the press release saying “it’s fastest and most reliable network ever can lure away even the most iconic people in wireless.”

Paul Marvarelli’s reason for switching was largely based on the fact that Sprint customers can spend less and still receive adequate network coverage compared to competing cellular services. If the difference in service between carriers’ network sizes and drop rates are all relatively the same, why spend more for the service? He further supported his argument with the fact that people don’t really talk on their smartphones anymore, since the text messaging works and users can get on the internet.

The enormous question however is How Paul Marcarelli secured the contract with Sprint?

First thing to note here is that Paul was a free agent since his contract with Verizon expired and remained free for close to 5 years before he was approached by Sprint.

According to Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure, Paul was approached to try out their network, He liked it and the duo decided to embark on a campaign together. Claure told CNNMoney. “We figured Paul would be the best person to tell everyone all networks are the same, but only Sprint can give you 50% off.

The brand ambassador concluded his Sprint ad by saying “So I switched to Sprint and millions more have too. Can you hear that?”

It is therefore safe to say that the once popular “Can you hear me now”? Commercial for Verizon has been transformed to “Can you hear that”? This time it for Sprint.