NEW YORK, USA: Speculation that Deutsche Telekom AG might buy Sprint Nextel Corp sent investors scrambling on Monday, coming as it did amid a wave of consolidation in the global wireless industry.

But while there are many possible merger scenarios involving U.S. operators, analysts say few deals would actually yield financial benefits in the near term.

"In some ways the challenge the wireless market faces is, if not T-Mobile and Sprint, then who? There simply aren't a lot of options for how you go about consolidating a market that is as overpopulated as this one," said Bernstein Research analyst Craig Moffett.

Here are a few of the most talked about potential partnerships and the problems each present:

Sprint and T-Mobile

If Deutsche Telekom combines its T-Mobile USA with Sprint, they would become No. 2 in the U.S. market -- ahead of AT&T Inc and behind Verizon Wireless, owned by Verizon Communications Inc and Vodafone Group Plc.

The deal could help them compete more effectively by creating a company with 82 million subscribers. Sprint now ranks third with 49 million subscribers and T-Mobile is fourth with 33 million.

But the new company would have to manage three incompatible networks -- Sprint's iDen and CDMA networks and T-Mobile's GSM network -- until a new common network could be built. Analysts question if such a deal would be worthwhile, given that Sprint has a market capitalization of $12 billion and liabilities of more than $19 billion.

"It would be an extraordinarily hard merger to pull off. The U.S. wireless market is crying out for consolidation, but it's not clear why Deutsche Telekom wants to be the guinea pig and suffer the pain of a hideous technology integration for the benefit of the rest of the market rather than themselves," said Moffett. "The technology incompatibility of their respective networks makes it a somewhat unappetizing task."

T-Mobile with leap wireless and/or MetroPCS

Deutsche Telekom could team T-Mobile USA with smaller rivals Leap Wireless International Inc and/or MetroPCS Communications Inc.

This could help T-Mobile USA absorb two of its most aggressive rivals, which both target the low-priced market and offer deep discounts.

Leap and MetroPCs have very little network overlap, so such an acquisition might be easier than buying Sprint's two networks, but it would still present some of the same problems. While Leap and MetroPCS both use CDMA technology, it is still incompatible with T-Mobile USA's GSM network.

Pacific Crest analyst Steve Clement said T-Mobile would eventually create savings by moving itself, Leap and MetroPCS to the same next-generation technology, but he said that would take at least five years.

"That's where you could get the cost savings. That's many years down the road," he said. "It would make most sense to buy both of them and operate them as a separate stand-alone brand."

Leap has a market value of $1.5 billion while MetroPCS is valued at $3.3 billion, based on Monday's share prices.

MetroPCS and leap

Analysts widely expect these companies to merge as they have similar business models. They also use the same network technologies and have little coverage overlap.

Their main obstacle appears to be reaching a compromise on price. MetroPCS made a $5.5 billion bid for Leap in 2007, but was rebuffed.

Leap has said publicly it believes a deal between the two could make sense. However, for the same reasons this deal would work -- its smaller size and lack of overlap -- it would do little to ease competitive pressure in the broader market.

Verizon Wireless or AT&T as acquirers

Verizon Wireless's network runs on the same technology as Sprint's and AT&T uses the same technology as T-Mobile USA.

However, analysts and executives have long said they do not expect these companies to make any big acquisitions as they would have difficulty getting approval from antitrust regulators.