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AT&T Businesses Cellphones Wireless Networking

AT&T Officially Ends Plans To Acquire T-Mobile USA 176

Posted by Soulskill from the admitting-defeat dept.
An anonymous reader writes "AT&T has officially announced that it no longer plans to purchase T-Mobile USA from Deutsche Telekom. In a press release, the company said, 'The actions by the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice to block this transaction do not change the realities of the U.S. wireless industry. It is one of the most fiercely competitive industries in the world, with a mounting need for more spectrum that has not diminished and must be addressed immediately. The AT&T and T-Mobile USA combination would have offered an interim solution to this spectrum shortage. In the absence of such steps, customers will be harmed and needed investment will be stifled.'"
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AT&T Officially Ends Plans To Acquire T-Mobile USA More

AT&T Officially Ends Plans To Acquire T-Mobile USA

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  • And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:39PM (#38427796)

    A t-mobile subscriber.

    • Now does DT use this 4 billion on TMo's network (LTE!) or save it and sell TMo to someone else. That is the question.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by Rich0 ( 548339 )

        I could care less - as long as they sell it to somebody who doesn't already operate a large mobile network in the US. They'd have every incentive to continue to improve the operation, and DT has every incentive to make TMo look good for sale.

    • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Captain Spam ( 66120 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:57PM (#38427950) Homepage

      Well, there was some rejoicing. Deutsche Telekom still wants out of the US market, so we can sort of expect to be treated like second-class citizens for a while until the inevitable occurs and either T-Mobile sinks entirely or someone ELSE buys them out.

      • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Insightful)

        by lanner ( 107308 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @07:19PM (#38428654)

        If the kind of service that I've gotten with TMobile over the last 10 years is "second-class", I'll have to say I like it. What would that make ATT customers? Fifth-class citizens?

        Remember that TMobile is a PROFITABLE company. They are actively making money. If DT would just cut them lose and give them the freedom to succeed or fail, I am willing to bet that they would do pretty well.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by icebike ( 68054 ) *

          Remember that TMobile is a PROFITABLE company. They are actively making money. If DT would just cut them lose and give them the freedom to succeed or fail, I am willing to bet that they would do pretty well.

          Profitable is an elusive beast. Its doubtful T-Mobile alone would survive.

          During the first quarter of 2011, T-Mobile saw its revenue hit $4.63 billion, putting it in line with the first quarter of 2010. However, the company's profit fell over $200 million year over year from $362 million last year to $135 million in the first quarter of 2011.

          http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20060353-17.html [cnet.com]

          They can see the writing on the wall, as their small market area makes it hard for them to compete.

          In addition DT has problems elsewhere, parts of their Euro market [businessweek.com] are also tanking. In fact the German market sees to be the only place they are making a good profit margin. They were counting on the now-defunct sale as a source of income.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by Belial6 ( 794905 )
            What small market area are you talking about? Last summer, I traveled in big loop around the US between California and Wisconsin. Wyoming was the only state that I did not get good signal in. I spent 6 weeks working from the back of a mini-van with no problems.

            I made a bone head configuration setting on my phone in Minisotta, and the customer service in the T-Mobile store in Minisotta was just as good as that here in California.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by icebike ( 68054 ) *

              Minnesota. Spell checker works for you as well as other people, and there is no penalty for using it.

              HINT: You were roaming on AT&T most of the time. But happy delusion day to you.

              • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Insightful)

                by danlip ( 737336 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @10:36PM (#38430054)

                Why is that delusional? He paid T-Mobile for service. He got service. Why does he care who owns the towers?

              • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:4, Interesting)

                by Zibodiz ( 2160038 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @11:58PM (#38430640) Homepage
                I'm a T-Mo customer living in Wyoming. I travel a lot for my job (I cover about 2.5 million square miles across 4 states, mostly in Wyoming), and my Android phone is roaming 95% of the time. The great thing is, being an Android phone, it tells me what network I'm roaming on, and lets me choose if I want to. The data flat does not work on most of the carriers, but the voice coverage is awesome. I'm never on AT&T (their coverage is always sub-par), but I always have 4 bars everywhere I go, including all the places my old Verizon phone had no coverage at all. I get to roam onto all the local carriers, and always have better coverage that anyone else. I cannot imagine a nicer setup (other than, say, getting to use data everywhere). My family that uses AT&T here in Wy hate it; poor coverage, rude customer service, and high prices.
                Oh, and it costs a third what my Verizon dumbphone did, without a data plan.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by Forbman ( 794277 )

                  Hmm... you must go to some obscure places in Wyoming (ok, that might be redundant...). My VZWL phone works fine, but that's mostly on I-80 corridor, Rawlins to Casper, Casper to Lusk, I-25 corridor. No roaming, or at least none that I notice. Even signal on most of US-30 between I-80 and I-15. But it does lose it north of Lusk once the terrain gets a bit rougher, but that's a terrain restriction. If I'm up high enough, it'll pick up a signal...

              • Re: (Score:3)

                by Belial6 ( 794905 )
                Hint: My phone tells me what network I am on. No. I wasn't roaming most of the time.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Ihmhi ( 1206036 )

              I live in Newark, NJ, and I used to be a T-Mobile customer. Their service was abysmal. I had to walk down the block from my home on some days to get a good enough signal to actually be able to understand people.

              I'm not exactly surrounded by skyscrapers here. The biggest building for blocks around my neighborhood is about 3 stories tall.

              If this were in a little podunk town it wouldn't be an issue, but Newark is the biggest city in NJ on population alone. My family stayed with them for something like 3 years

              • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:4, Informative)

                by Scoth ( 879800 ) on Tuesday December 20, 2011 @11:06AM (#38435580)

                It seems like every discussion on cell phone providers ends up with stories like this. People who've had little or no problem everywhere they go, people who had trouble with signal on one provider in some area but fine with another, etc. I had an opposite experience with Verizon and T-Mobile - Verizon sucked in my house in a suburb of Atlanta, both T-Mobile and now AT&T have been great. Verizon also sucked at my in-law's house out in the very middle of nowhere PA, while T-Mobile also sucked and AT&T is at least usable.

                So, it pretty much seems like everyone needs to find the provider that works best in their area while they all need to work more on network coverage.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by icebike ( 68054 ) *

        Well, there was some rejoicing. Deutsche Telekom still wants out of the US market, so we can sort of expect to be treated like second-class citizens for a while until the inevitable occurs and either T-Mobile sinks entirely or someone ELSE buys them out.

        They have said they wanted out, with 4 billion may change their mind.

        They are not particularly profitable in the US because they are tied to the Euro mind-set of how mobile works. It doesn't work that way in North America, and never has. The area you need to cover is vast, the technologies in place are varied, and other than a Cutey in a Pink Dress, they don't have anything that is significantly different than any one of several small-fry carriers.

        They need to change their mindset, realize they are in it f

    • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by devleopard ( 317515 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:02PM (#38427998) Homepage

      Just remember why Deutsche Telekom wanted to get rid of T-Mobile: it's a bad business for them, they want out. They tried to sell before (to Orange). T-Mobile will still get bought, or will go under. Why did Sprint oppose the deal? They don't care who owns their competitors: they knew T-Mobile was in a death march, and knew they'd get customers when they flatlined. The AT&T deal kept them from getting that plunder. (To say nothing of the assets that will come available when T-Mobile declares bankruptcy)

      Of course, T-Mobile gets a couple of billion dollars from AT&T due to the failed merger, which should hold off failure for a couple of years. Nonetheless, if you're a T-Mobile customer, you need to keep your eyes open and determine who your next carrier will be.

      • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

        by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) * on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:10PM (#38428058)
        Comment removed based on user account deletion

        • Re:T-Mobile USA is not sliding towards bankruptcy. (Score:5, Interesting)

          by SecurityFocus ( 1535169 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:30PM (#38428218)
          Right. T mobile is a very pervasive player in the Telecommunications landscape. SBC or AT&T as they like to be called, LOVES to buy out direct competitors. They saw Tmobile as a very large player in the space and coupled with T-mobile's 4g network and affordable prices, it was a natural fit for them. I worked for AT&T both before and after they where purchased by SBC. Which I detailed some of my experiences at http://whyattdestroysjobs.wordpress.com/ [wordpress.com] ... Let's just say while I was there, ATT management as well as Sales Managers such as myself while I was employed with AT&T where constantly going up against T mobile.. Simply because they T-mobile offered affordable plans, greater flexibility in devices, and more affordable and faster service(s) and CUSTOMER SERVICE that was hands down better than AT&T/SBC. Only what ATT did not bargain on- which frankly they should of KNOWN is the current economy and state of affairs in DC - that proposing a Merger in an election year when unemployment is at record highs and their is further economic uncertainty around the world, that a deal like this that would stifle innovation, lead to higher consumer prices, et al could not of been proposed at a worse time!

        • T-Mobile USA makes money. It just doesn't make enough money for the corporate overlords at DT. They don't view the United States as a growth market without billions of dollars in capital investment they've thus far been unwilling to make. Absent that investment T-Mobile USA will remain what it has always been: an urban focused value carrier.

          I live in an urban/suburban area and have great coverage. When I travel to a more rural area, which I do frequently, my T-Mobile phone roams on the AT&T network if T-Mo isn't available. The collapse of this deal will only help since not only does T-Mo get $3 billion cash, they get a transfer of radio spectrum to T-Mobile and a more favorable network-sharing agreement. DT valued the breakup package at as much as $7 billion.

          I travel to Europe enough that I need a GSM phone. T-Mo provides great service

        • This is what is wrong with the business world as a whole worldwide. It isn't 'good enough' to make a quality product that provides something useful to you customers and pays all the employees while turning a smallish profit. it must GROW GROW GROW , which sooner or later always messes over the customer and creates unstable markets, because guess what , resources and capital aren't infinite.

      • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Informative)

        by InlawBiker ( 1124825 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:22PM (#38428160)

        T-Mobile is very profitable. Deutsche only wants out because it's no longer in growth mode. It certainly won't grow any without spectrum and LTE, and it can't afford either one. So yeah it will be sold or merged one way or another, but it's not a bad business. They can ride their faux-G network for a while but not forever.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Rimbo ( 139781 )

          "Faux-G?" I get legit 3.5Mbps downloads at work on this "faux" G network. I'm pretty happy with that.

      • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Insightful)

        by sjames ( 1099 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:34PM (#38428234) Homepage Journal

        T-Mobile is doing fine, it's just that DK wants to go in a different direction. They're not going to crash and burn a valuable asset just to exit the U.S. wireless market though. They'll try to sell it off somewhere instead (being careful to maintain it's value in the mean while), or perhaps spin it out and sell it one share at a time.

      • I think Sprint opposed the deal simply because they made a lot of bad technology bets and decisions over the years and the reality is that they can't grow their market share. So as long as T-Mobile survives as an independent company, they can tell their shareholders "We're number three! We're number three! We've got a chance to be number two!" Saying to your shareholders "We're in last place among the major carriers with no chance for growth" doesn't play as well as bragging that at least you're not in

    • Re:And there was much rejoicing !! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Miamicanes ( 730264 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:25PM (#38428190)

      From Sprint subscribers, too. T-Mobile's our lifeboat and sanctuary if Sprint becomes evil someday.

  • What says they won't try another way? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sethstorm ( 512897 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:42PM (#38427826) Homepage

    It just seems odd that AT&T would let a leak stop them from acquiring T-Mobile.

    As a very satisfied T-Mobile customer with flat-rate 3G, I'm not going to put it beyond AT&T to try some less-visible route to get rid of the only national carrier that doesn't try to meter data.

    • A four billion dollar non-refundable breakup fee? Why would you want to pay such an enormous fee to abandon your buyout attempt ... and then close the buy out anyway?

      The deal is dead, dead, dead as a doornail, done. AT&T would not be paying four billion dollars to one of its biggest competitors if it thought there was a snowball's chance in hell it could avoid doing so.

  • Why link to a story which only rehashes the press (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:44PM (#38427838)

    The story just rehashes the press release by AT&T.

    And by the time the story got to Slashdot, others have already written decent stories about it - those would have made much better links.

    The business perspective [bloomberg.com].

    The regular news [nytimes.com]

    And the tech perspective [arstechnica.com]

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:44PM (#38427842)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • I'd agree. That, and if you had a good plan, you got to keep your good plan - even if you did things that would cause AT&T to switch your plan to a worse one.

    • Even better: MetroPCS has unlimited data for cheap, lets you activate any CDMA device you like, and has no fixed-length service contracts.
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Do they still use DPI to intercept "media" downloads that might be used to egregiously abuse their network by getting ringtones and wallpapers without jumping through their stupid "locker" hoops or buying it from them?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Aryden ( 1872756 )
        If you want all of your calls to sound like they are coming from the opposite end of a 2 mile tunnel and not be able to use your phone in half the places the other carriers can. My roommate in GA has metro and can't even use it in the house.
    • They're also the only major carrier which reduces your monthly fee once your contract ends. With the other carriers, while you're in contract, part of your service bill goes to paying off our phone's subsidy. And when you're out of contract, your service bill remains the same, and what used to pay for your subsidy goes to lining the company's coffers.

  • HA! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by autocracy ( 192714 ) <slashdot2007@sto ... m ['emo' in gap]> on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:47PM (#38427864) Homepage

    Bite me, AT&T. Auto repair is competitive.

      * Cell phones in the US have a small pool of providers, especially the nation-wide crowd.
      * They primarily operate with 2 year contracts, and it's hard to get a phone without one.
      * There's a financial disincentive for buying a phone without a contract.
      * Text message rates (for which there is very little data usage, being measured in bytes) have been increasing.
      * Data plans have been increasing in price and providing tighter bandwidth restrictions at the same time.

    I loathe AT&T, and I'm stuck with them. Competitive? I'd get out in a heartbeat if I felt I had somewhere to go. T-Mobile has been the closest saving grace to AT&T, so I really don't want to see that absorbed.

    Thanks to the Fed did -- they did one right there.

    • "Stuck with" AT&T huh? I feel your pain; I was stuck on a family plan for ten years with that God-awful mess that is AT&T, because everyone in the family kept renewing their two-year contracts at different times, and everyone was afraid to take the early termination fee hit.

      Finally I just did the math and legwork myself and forced the rest of the family to take the plunge with me; turns out that even with ETFs and having to buy our handsets outright we're going to save hundreds of dollars over the n

  • I know a lot of people who's contracts were up and jumped ship on the news that AT&T was going to buy them. I don't know the percentage but every T-Mobile subscriber I know all moved to other carriers when they heard the initial announcement.

    • Re:It still hurt T-Mobile bad (Score:5, Informative)

      by Jeng ( 926980 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:52PM (#38427904)

      That is why AT&T is going to pay them around 3 Billion in compensation.

      • Re:It still hurt T-Mobile bad (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Esteanil ( 710082 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:56PM (#38428458) Homepage Journal

        I know a lot of people who's contracts were up and jumped ship on the news that AT&T was going to buy them. I don't know the percentage but every T-Mobile subscriber I know all moved to other carriers when they heard the initial announcement

        That is why AT&T is going to pay them around 3 Billion in compensation.

        So, T-Mobile is undersubscribed, (Wee, bandwidth!) and gets 3 billion to build up their network with... Invest 85/15% in infrastructure / the advertising campaign they're gonna need, and they might well become a significant player on the US market again, wouldn't you say?

        And full speed LTE on a carrier with a solid network is a beautiful thing.

    • On the other hand my wife and I were holding off on merging our cell accounts into one account because of the threat of a merger. Now that the threat is over we can get her off of AT&T, and get her a new phone.

    • I jumped the other way, actually. I wanted to have a grandfathered T-mobile plan on AT&T's network. :D

      But now that I made the switch I am so happy. I have had a couple of coverage issues since making the switch, like not being able to get a signal when I was in Yosemite, but I'm saving so much on my bill, and the customer service is so much better, it's just not a big deal to me.

    • every T-Mobile subscriber I know all moved to other carriers when they heard the initial announcement.

      Now that's just stupid. Why jump just because they COULD be bought? It's not like AT&T can prevent them from leaving once they take over, and porting a number takes about 24-48 hours these days.

  • Our cell phone oligopoly will have four participants instead of three!
    • US Cellular, MetroPCS, and other smaller carriers have significant market share in the areas that they're available.

      • Yes, subscribing customers that the others won't touch, or have already done business with and won't do business with again. Have you seen the pricing on US Cellular or MetroPCS? Hilarity.

  • AT&T Attitude Problem Hasn't Changed (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:48PM (#38427872)

    "We own our customers." has been the attitude for decades.

    Has anybody forgotten their CEO's "my pipes" speech with the subtext of "That's a nice internet connection you have. Be a shame if anything happened to it."?

  • Re-Title This Accordingly (Score:5, Interesting)

    by crow_t_robot ( 528562 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:52PM (#38427908)
    DoJ/FCC Officially End AT&T's Plans To Acquire T-Mobile USA
    Because that's who really made the final decision.

  • Good news (Score:5, Insightful)

    by BCW2 ( 168187 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @05:54PM (#38427928) Journal
    There is a reason that AT&T was broken up 25 or so years ago. Those reasons still hold true. They were the worst service and most dishonest company around in the 70's. I have not dealt with them since I was given a choice and never would again. They don't need to buy other companies and become bigger.
    • Too bad the current AT&T isn't the AT&T from the 1970's. It is SBC, which was one of the baby-bell spinoffs from when AT&T was broken up. They bought a bunch of the other spinoffs and splits, etc., over the years, and a couple years back, bought AT&T, and then renamed themselves AT&T since it was the more widely known name (and they owned it so they could do whatever they wanted). So, the current AT&T is actually one of the spin offs that AT&T that you hated was broken up into...

      • Too bad the current AT&T isn't the AT&T from the 1970's.

        True. But they seem to be trying to make the old AT&T look like... uhh... some less evil, cutthroat bunch of bastards (wish I could think of any that weren't small game studios... )

      • Re:Good news (Score:5, Insightful)

        by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Monday December 19, 2011 @07:59PM (#38428936) Homepage Journal

        Too bad the current AT&T isn't the AT&T from the 1970's. It is SBC, which was one of the baby-bell spinoffs from when AT&T was broken up. [...] So, the current AT&T is actually one of the spin offs that AT&T that you hated was broken up into....

        So you're saying that the current AT&T actually is the old AT&T, since it's made up of one of the splinters of the old AT&T which has bought most of the other pieces of the old AT&T? Thanks for clearing that up for us.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Rich0 ( 548339 )

          Everything you said is of course true, but I think you're both missing the point. Any company given the power of the original AT&T would be just as bad. There are no such things as "good companies" or "bad companies" - just good and bad people. About the only time you'll see a big company run by the former is if they are the founder, or their hand-picked replacement.

          • I agree with what you say, but what I find particularly chilling about this is that the phone company was broken up and we learned nothing. It's a bit sad when you see the same mistakes repeated. If we ever learn the lesson that government is about infrastructure and that boundless profit doesn't work in a system with bounds we can go back to living in paradise.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I hope that you are not using Verizon now, because that would be ironic. It is still hard to get away from AT&T. it is just now they have more names.

    • Back then you pretty much knew what you were dealing with when you signed up to AT&T. I remember their bills detailing line fees, equipment fees, long distance charges, etc. You knew they were going to rape you and and rape you good anytime you did business with them. They really didn't become dishonest and try to disguise their raping ways until they had to deal with honest competition.

  • The AT&T and T-Mobile USA combination would have offered an interim solution

    Boy, howdy, AT&T, you can say that again. It is unexpectedly honest of you to recognized that this could only be considered a good thing in the interim. Surely would have been a loss to our information infrastructure in the long run, but you are right that it may have smoothed out the short run a bit. How an honest person managed to slip a hint of truth into your deceptioneering is beyond me.

    Whoever wrote that bit, well done

  • The FCC and DOJ actually stopped a merger that would be bad for the consumer?
    This has got to be a trick or I am dreaming.
    Next thing you know the FCC will make Cable companies offer channels alacart and not charge extra for local HD channels over SD channels.

  • "If we cannot reassemble our monopoly, it's bad for everyone!" We're dominating you, enshrining ourselves in legal scripture, raising your prices and smashing your service quality FOR YOUR OWN GOOD!"

  • Think of the poor customers. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Joe U ( 443617 ) on Monday December 19, 2011 @06:16PM (#38428112) Homepage Journal

    The AT&T and T-Mobile USA combination would have offered an interim solution to this spectrum shortage. In the absence of such steps, customers will be harmed and needed investment will be stifled.

    And I bet the grapes were sour too.

  • This probably had something to do with it. Verizon found a way to buy as much spectrum as they wanted while jumping through way less regulation hurdles. http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/12/verizon-buys-up-spectrum/2/ [wired.com]

    • Actually it says it had to go through the same hurdles, but it was less likely to be turned down because they aren't gobbling up a competitor.

      As an AT&T customer I really get sick of how poorly the service works at my work. Oh if I go outside its a bit different but if I'm inside the usable spectrum drops drastically and when you get... I don't know, 4 thousand subscribers in a single cell, you don't really get any throughput. Adding spectrum wouldn't certainly help, especially if its on the lower frequ

      • They don't need more spectrum. They need smaller cells and to parter with your workplace to install them inside the building. It's a cell phone, not an HF rig. You deal with density by increasing the number of cells in the area.

  • Sprint will renew their offer to buy T-Mobile, and possibly sell some spectrum to AT&T and/or Verizon in markets where Sprint + T-Mobile has more spectrum than they need. That would make almost everyone happy (maybe not some T-Mobile customers). AT&T will complain, but that's just because they don't want anything that might make Sprint a stronger competitor. Verizon probably won't object. Just my $0.02 of speculation.

  • Let me repeat my ideas. Essentially put a couple short range cell towers on every block. Put it on top of peoples homes. They pay the electricity but get free internet. Very simple.You get the option as part of your internet connection.

    Normal cell towers then become backups for cities.

    The block towers would only transmit up to a few blocks with radio bands being interleaved. So long as each of the local cell towers could handle a few hundred users then everything would work out.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Fjandr ( 66656 )

      Decentralization is anathema to any sort of big business interest in the US, unfortunately. It would also require a complete re-work of how the FCC operates that spectrum band, from nationally-licensed to being licensed more like FM radio spectrum is. Too many post-FCC brib^H^H^H^Hemployment opportunities at stake to do something like that.

  • As someone who used to work at T-Mobile... (Score:3)

    by euroq ( 1818100 ) on Tuesday December 20, 2011 @03:55AM (#38431914)

    As a person who used to work at T-Mobile, and was privy to some insider information about the economic and technological aspects of the deal, I believe this is going to be a bad thing for T-Mobile and its customers. The problem T-Mobile is facing is that its parent company, Deutsche Telecom, is not investing in T-Mobile in the amount that it needs to catch up to the bigger customers. All of the 4 billion dollars that AT&T is required to pay T-Mobile is going to DT, and not likely* to be used for T-Mobile infrastructure. T-Mobile simply cannot catch up in terms of capital to compete with Verizon and AT&T.

    * I can't say how much of the 4 billion dollars will or will not be, but the idea when we were discussing the deal was that 1. we didn't think we had to worry about it, and 2. if the deal did actually fail, the money went straight to DT and would not affect their investments in T-Mobile USA.

    There was lots of talk about how the merger would have stifled innovation and created monopolistic problems. Well, those who said it don't understand the technological problems of the wireless utility industry. There is not enough spectrum for either AT&T or T-Mobile to compete separately while providing the best service for their customers. There is not enough capital for T-Mobile to build wireless infrastructure across the country. If there were, you may have a case about a monopoly. But there isn't, so you don't. There isn't enough spectrum for AT&T, and there isn't enough money for T-Mobile. T-Mobile isn't going to be able to provide the best customer service in the business and the coolest phones (only one of the four without iPhone) and the capital infrastructure for 4G and future wireless technologies.

    Both companies, and the American consumer, has lost because of this deal's breakdown. I no longer work at T-Mobile, and I think they will continue to be a successful company, but I believe they will be drowned out by Verizon and AT&T due to their size, regardless of T-Mobile's continued nimbleness and "scrappiness".

  • The $4B from AT&T represents 4.3x TM's last 4 quarters of earnings.

    Deutsch Telekom desperately wants to unload them. With 4 years profits in the bag they should just firesale them off at this point and declare victory.

    The alternative is to make massive investments to try and end the hemmoraging of subscribers and turn the company around. The odds of their management making that happen successfully are somewhere between slim and unlikely.

    No one else in the cellular market is going to want to buy them
  • Boo fricken hoo. -A common carrier employee

  • Carly Foulkes is safe.

  • "blah blah blah customers will be harmed"

    Suck my dick, AT&T.

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