As T-Mobile Deal Dies, AT&T CEO Keeps Lying DC's Lobbying Juggernaut Finally Gets Told 'No' Adding yet another wrinkle to AT&T's already troubled T-Mobile takeover bid, the Department of Justice today informed a Judge the agency wanted to postpone the trial. Justice Department lawyer Joseph Wayland is arguing that an expedited trial is no longer necessary because AT&T on Thanksgiving (hoping to minimize the PR hit) pulled their FCC deal application. According to DOJ logic, if there's no merger application, there's no merger to block -- and it would be a waste of court time if AT&T proposed a new plan at the FCC in a few months. Meanwhile, the Washington Post is running what's essentially an obituary for the deal. The piece notes how AT&T has spent more on campaign contributions than any company since 1990, and as a result hasn't been told "no" by a regulator since the original Ma Bell breakup. But something happened on the way to the T-Mobile deal: AT&T's repeated lies and astroturf efforts were so obnoxious, they managed to rub even factually-challenged Washington DC the wrong way: The letters from third-party groups raised eyebrows at government agencies and on the Hill, where people began wondering why groups with no obvious ties to broadband were writing in. News reports emerged showing that many of the groups had financial ties to AT&T. Then there were the ads that staff members at the FCC said they couldn’t avoid when they opened a newspaper, fired up their iPads or watched TV — all touting the merger’s ability to put thousands of Americans to work. But who had ever heard of a big company merger creating rather than destroying jobs? The Post suggests that it was AT&T's hubris and heavy promotion of their false claims that made regulators take a closer look. When they decided to fact check ( who are you and what have you done with our merger-loving regulators?), they found arguments that were completely full of holes: AT&T’s blitzkrieg of ads, which claimed that the promised expansion of broadband would create 100,000 jobs, wasn’t helping either. A deal’s impact on jobs is not typically part of an evaluation by antitrust officials, but this time regulators thought AT&T’s campaign had forced them to take a closer look. They found holes. For one, the company refused to divulge how many jobs it would eliminate in the merger. The piece rather floats over the fact that most of AT&T's claimed benefits of the T-Mobile deal were thoroughly debunked after an AT&T attorney accidentally publicized AT&T data. AT&T waged one of the largest telecom disinformation efforts we've ever seen, paying groups ranging from cattle ranchers to ballooning associations to write in to the FCC in support of the deal. Jim Cicconi, AT&T's top lobbyist and the man behind most of these sleazy efforts tells the Post "this has been some of the worst couple weeks of my life." With AT&T's political pull it's hard to believe the deal is dead until it truly dies, and AT&T's doing everything in its power to salvage the acquisition. So far their tactics don't appear to be particularly sophisticated, and consist largely of repetition and denial. As deal approval gets increasingly unlikely, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson continues to pretend that the deal will lower prices, improve competition, and improve service, something even our pay-to-play government is finding it hard to believe.
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  IPPlanManHoly Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC
kudos:1 | Should have sent more cupcakes to the FCC... Should have sent more cupcakes to the FCC... 
AT&T lost a lot of goodwill and capital in this town.
Completely tone-deaf campaigning by AT&T to get this merger done... not to mention the billions of dollars that went flying out the window.
What a screwup....
--
"We're going to start at one end of (Fallujah), and we're not going to stop until we get to the other. If there's anybody left when that happens, we're going to turn around and we're going to go back and finish it."
Lt. Col. Pete Newell: 1st Inf. US Army | |
| | | Finally....... Trying to get this turkey through was just way too expensive for many big T stockholders tastes and really took their eye off the ball of their competitor's movements. Now they now find themselves behind both sprint (clearwire deal) and Verizon (cable frequency holdings purchase) in the wireless bandwidth game. | |
|  exocet_cmI am the law - Judge DreddPremium
join:2003-03-23
New Orleans, LA
kudos:2 | AT&T told no? No way. THIS is news! | |
|  IllIlIlllIllEliteDataPremium
join:2003-07-06
Hampton Bays, NY
kudos:7 | Greed dont blame at&t as a whole for the lies, blame the stockholders.
greed, working at its best for you and me. | |
|  | | | Re: Greed Hey don't blame stockholders. The exec's and board had some of us fooled, but it became very clear (mostly through the media) that the costs of the effort and massive lobbying checks being written were negating any real value of pursuing the purchase. | |
| | |  BF69Premium
join:2004-07-28
Camden, TN | Re: Greed said by JasonOD :Hey don't blame stockholders. I do. WAY too mnay times stockholder looking for a quick buck instead of long term gains (like the way it USED to be ) fuck things up. Quit being in such a hurry to make a trillion $$$ think BIG PICTURE and long term. Are you going to die tomorrow? Nope. And if you are you don't need the money you will be dead. Even if you're 50 you still got 16 years until retirement. What is the fucking hurry? | |
| | | | Reviews:
 ·Insight Communic..
| Re: Greed BF69, Piss Off, not all stock holders are like that, the oes you speak of are the large investment banks and hedge funds that hold T stock in their portfollios that cause this garbage, while those of us that have it in our 401Ks are in for long term. | |
| | | | | IllIlIlllIllEliteDataPremium
join:2003-07-06
Hampton Bays, NY
kudos:7 | Re: Greed said by OSUGoose:BF69, Piss Off, not all stock holders are like that, the ones you speak of are the large investment banks and hedge funds that hold T stock in their portfolios that cause this garbage, while those of us that have it in our 401Ks are in for long term.
your point is exactly what i meant.
the majority of the stock holders is what you outlined in your comment.
its another reason why this country is going down hill... fast.
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Suffolk County NY Police Feed - »www.scpdny.com
PS3 Gaming Feed - »www.livestream.com/elitedata | |
| | | | | | | | Re: Greed I dont consider Instutional Holders to be real stockholders, as there whole existance is to deliver returns to their clients. While those of us who are in for the long haul get pissed on. | |
| | | | | | | | | Re: Greed The markets are largely controlled by mega large speculators and hedgers.
Then Wall St insiders and congress use this knowledge that the rest of us don't have access to in order to make 15+ % gains on a regular basis.
For the average lay person the stock market is no better than a casino. | |
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IPPlanManHoly Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC
kudos:1 | The Drone Speak Continues "AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson continues to pretend that the deal will lower prices, improve competition, and improve service..."
AT&T can do this on their own.... But they haven't.
What they've done pre-merger....
- Gotten rid of unlimited data plans for the iPhone
- Pulled the unlimited no-contract data plan for the iPad 3G about 40 days after launch
- Gotten rid of tiered texting plans... Now it's zero or unlimited for 20 bucks per month (with lots of minutes)
- Has built out its LTE network to only 15 cities compared to 190 LTE cities which Verizon managed to accomplish in a year...
Heck of a job AT&T...
--
"We're going to start at one end of (Fallujah), and we're not going to stop until we get to the other. If there's anybody left when that happens, we're going to turn around and we're going to go back and finish it."
Lt. Col. Pete Newell: 1st Inf. US Army | |
| | | | Re: The Drone Speak Continues What does LTE have to do with anything ? I don't see Sprint or T-Mobile with it, and VZW is the largest wireless carrier.
Speaking of LTE.. is Verizons LTE still down ? | |
| | | IPPlanManHoly Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC
kudos:1 | Re: The Drone Speak Continues LTE has to do with the fact that AT&T hasn't made itself competitive with its own resources and capital.
- Verizon was able to accomplish an LTE network buildout to 190 cities in about a Year, with construction going on nationwide.
- For comparison, the Empire State Building was built in 1 Year and 45 days, with construction all on one site.
The best that AT&T can do is LTE to 15 cities? Seriously? With the Billions they've got and the "cupcake" lobbying army?
The best thing that could happen right now is a T-Mobile iPhone...
Please bring it Apple...
--
"We're going to start at one end of (Fallujah), and we're not going to stop until we get to the other. If there's anybody left when that happens, we're going to turn around and we're going to go back and finish it."
Lt. Col. Pete Newell: 1st Inf. US Army | |
| | | | Reviews:
·RoadRunner Cable
| Re: The Drone Speak Continues I'd personally love to see a T-Mobile 3G/4G iPhone.
If AT&T wasn't competitive... they'd be losing customers, not gaining them. It'd be better to say that AT&T is not consumer friendly. Can companies like AT&T deploy more LTE.. sure. Do they 'need' to - hell no. Does Verizon need to - hell yeah. VZW's (as well as Sprint) are at the end of the life cycle of CDMA 1x/EVDO. | |
| | | | | Reviews:
 ·Frontier Communi..
| Re: The Drone Speak Continues Verizon seems to have a very different corporate culture than AT&T. AT&T has at times made changes to their network that have negatively impacted existing users. Moving GSM off cellular bands and onto PCS for instance. Some people went to bed with four bars and woke up with none because of this change. They did the same when they were in the process of transitioning away from the TDMA network. I can't recall Verizon ever doing anything like this.
Verizon also seems to make more of an effort to invest in their infrastructure. 190 cities with LTE? FiOS deployments? What has AT&T done?
I'm not a Verizon shrill by any means -- I dislike their arrogance a great deal. It's just that the choice between them and AT&T is not a particularly hard one to make. Both will bend you over but the difference is Verizon won't skip town when you get pregnant... 
Anyway, AT&T may be competitive amongst the masses but for those in the know it's a different story. Hell, even non-technical folks in certain markets have wised up to AT&T's nonsense. You don't have to be a techie to understand dropped calls and a congested network (ever known an AT&T user in New York City?)... | |
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| |  djdanskaRudie32Premium,MVM
join:2001-04-21
MX
kudos:4 | T-Mobile may not but I have no problem downloading at over 30Mb/a on my 4g galaxy tab 10.1 and amaze 4g. it may not be lte but its good enough for me! | |
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|  ptrowskiGot Helix?Premium
join:2005-03-14
Putnam, CT
kudos:4 | Did AT&T piss in your cereal at some point? You seem to be right there with each and every article that pops up. | |
| | | IPPlanManHoly Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC
kudos:1 | Re: The Drone Speak Continues I'm an avid DSLR reader....
Being in DC and doing what I do has enabled me to see lobbying flacks for what they really are.
Believe me, AT&T has egg on its face in this town... bigtime.
The phony astroturf campaign is what really irks me personally. | |
| | | | ptrowskiGot Helix?Premium
join:2005-03-14
Putnam, CT
kudos:4 | Re: The Drone Speak Continues Of course they do.
So what is it that you do? | |
| | | | | IPPlanManHoly Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC
kudos:1 | Re: The Drone Speak Continues Stakeholder engagement.... | |
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| | |  cdruGo ColtsPremium,MVM
join:2003-05-14
Fort Wayne, IN
kudos:7 | said by IPPlanMan:Being in DC and doing what I do has enabled me to see lobbying flacks for what they really are.
You don't have to live in DC to know what the flacks really are. | |
| | | | | IPPlanManHoly Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC
kudos:1 | Re: The Drone Speak Continues said by cdru:said by IPPlanMan:Being in DC and doing what I do has enabled me to see lobbying flacks for what they really are.
You don't have to live in DC to know what the flacks really are. Ain't that the truth. Couldn't agree more.
--
"We're going to start at one end of (Fallujah), and we're not going to stop until we get to the other. If there's anybody left when that happens, we're going to turn around and we're going to go back and finish it."
Lt. Col. Pete Newell: 1st Inf. US Army | |
|
|  n2jtx
join:2001-01-13
Glen Head, NY | said by IPPlanMan:What they've done pre-merger....
- Gotten rid of unlimited data plans for the iPhone
- Pulled the unlimited no-contract data plan for the iPad 3G about 40 days after launch
- Gotten rid of tiered texting plans... Now it's zero or unlimited for 20 bucks per month (with lots of minutes)
- Has built out its LTE network to only 15 cities compared to 190 LTE cities which Verizon managed to accomplish in a year...
Heck of a job AT&T...
- Unlike with other devices they carry, has stated they WILL NEVER unlock an iPhone even after the customer contract is finished thus forcing you to pay their expensive international roaming charges.
--
I support the right to keep and arm bears. | |
| | | IPPlanManHoly Cable Modem Batman
join:2000-09-20
Washington, DC
kudos:1 | Re: The Drone Speak Continues Good point. Exactly. | |
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n2jtx
join:2001-01-13
Glen Head, NY | Not Exactly AT&T Meanwhile, the Washington Post is running what's essentially an obituary for the deal. The piece notes how AT&T has spent more on campaign contributions than any company since 1990, and as a result hasn't been told "no" by a regulator since the original Ma Bell breakup. It should be noted the warmed over dung calling itself "at&t" IS NOT the "Ma Bell" AT&T of years past but rather SBC Communications renamed "at&t". The former "Ma Bell" AT&T was a heavily regulated monopoly that did do some good; Bell Labs and Western Electric are two notable divisions and their contributions to electrical engineering and the physical sciences are well represented. The mere fact that SBC now calls itself "at&t" does not change the fact that it is a lousy corporate citizen and they are finally learning the lesson "payback is a bitch".
--
I support the right to keep and arm bears. | |
| | | The deal won't be pulled by AT&T... ..... until they have added to the damage that they have already done to T-Mobile.
TMO has been bleeding customers, in part due to throngs not wanting to become customers of the Deathstar.
TMO becomes a better competitor the minute it gets AT&T's breakup-fee cash & spectrum (and maybe an AWS iPhone model), so AT&T will stall the inevitable announcement of a dead deal for as long as possible for those reasons.
Hopefully TMO will then sue AT&T for some anti-competitive behavior once the check clears the bank. | |
| | | | Re: The deal won't be pulled by AT&T... overall still its funny but i am happy it happen. about dam time | |
| | | | Don't cry too hard for TM. They were bleeding customers before the AT&T deal was ever contemplated.
Also, the compensation package, if the deal fails, goes directly the Deutsche Telekom and does not have to be used in the interests of the TM USA business.
From the moment that TM failed to participate in the last round of the spectrum auction that led to the 700 mhz frequency being distributed for LTE deployment, it was clear that Deutsche Telekom (DT) had no long term strategy for TM USA and were only interested in setting the company up for sale/merger. Without that spectrum, TM USA have no route to compete with the leading carriers as they shift to delivering both data and voice over full 4G bandwidth.
Forget about the compensation package helping TM USA to recover from 2+ years of declining subscriptions. DT want the money from the sale to go to support their European operations. They've already said so.
Even with the situation regarding AT&T clarified, Apple will probably not agree to the release of an iPhone model with the required AWS (1700/2100) frequencies because the status of TM USA will remain deeply uncertain. In fact, its viability without AT&T or the compensation funds will become even more precarious until another adequate buyer steps up, which can not only meet DT's revised asking price, but also show the wherewithal to invest in the critically overdue network upgrade that will keep TM USA competitive as the rest of the top tier evolve into LTE.
said by MaynardKrebs:..... until they have added to the damage that they have already done to T-Mobile.
TMO has been bleeding customers, in part due to throngs not wanting to become customers of the Deathstar.
TMO becomes a better competitor the minute it gets AT&T's breakup-fee cash & spectrum (and maybe an AWS iPhone model), so AT&T will stall the inevitable announcement of a dead deal for as long as possible for those reasons.
Hopefully TMO will then sue AT&T for some anti-competitive behavior once the check clears the bank.
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| | | clone
join:2000-12-11
Portage, IN | Re: The deal won't be pulled by AT&T... said by philyew :Even with the situation regarding AT&T clarified, Apple will probably not agree to the release of an iPhone model with the required AWS (1700/2100) frequencies because the status of TM USA will remain deeply uncertain.
Oh bullshit. Apple is just extorting money out of the Big 3 to keep it away from TM USA. AT&T probably paid extra to keep the AWS bands out in hopes TM USA customers would clamor for the buyout to be approved. The iPhone 4S chipset supports 1700/2100, and while it may not have the necessary amplifiers/antennas tuned for that frequency (or it may, I'm no RF engineer), given the number of iPhones in use on carriers with much more uncertainty than DT in banana republics across the globe, DT is a pretty safe bet in comparison. | |
| | | | | | Re: The deal won't be pulled by AT&T... DT are running T-Mobile USA as a "discontinued operation"..check out their half-year financial report for details. They have made it abundantly clear that they are done with the US market as an operator.
How that progresses for TM USA will be deeply uncertain without AT&T. TM USA is a company which is on the brink of falling out of the leading group of carriers because, without a takeover by a major spectrum holder, they have zero capability to take the next step to LTE.
Even though AT&T's compensation package contains unspecified spectrum, that package goes directly to Deutsche Telekom to use and dispose of at their discretion. None of it need be used for the long term benefit of TM USA unless it clearly profits DT to do so more than direct disposal would do.
AT&T conspiring in hopes that "TM USA customers would clamor for the buyout to be approved"? Really? Comscore have just published the latest count of the number of mobile subscribers in the USA using the iPhone. After years of penetration into the AT&T market, after almost a year of availability with the largest cell service provider, Verizon, and a month of Sprint users eagerly snapping up their first opportunity with the device, less than 11% of mobile subscriptions in the USA use the iPhone.
Take a look at the T-Mobile user forums - with over 150,000 registered users, there are less than 100 posts on the topic of the iPhone not being available. Some clamoring...
Why on earth would Apple be working to keep the iPhone away from TM, if they thought the future was viable, when they have just released it not only to Sprint but also C Spire (formerly Cellular South) - a company primarily serving Mississippi, Alabama and limited parts of Florida, Tennessee and Georgia? | |
| | | | | | | Re: The deal won't be pulled by AT&T... said by philyew :AT&T conspiring in hopes that "TM USA customers would clamor for the buyout to be approved"? Really? Comscore have just published the latest count of the number of mobile subscribers in the USA using the iPhone. After years of penetration into the AT&T market, after almost a year of availability with the largest cell service provider, Verizon, and a month of Sprint users eagerly snapping up their first opportunity with the device, less than 11% of mobile subscriptions in the USA use the iPhone.
Take a look at the T-Mobile user forums - with over 150,000 registered users, there are less than 100 posts on the topic of the iPhone not being available. Some clamoring...
Why on earth would Apple be working to keep the iPhone away from TM, if they thought the future was viable, when they have just released it not only to Sprint but also C Spire (formerly Cellular South) - a company primarily serving Mississippi, Alabama and limited parts of Florida, Tennessee and Georgia?
This is quite misleading. Everyone knows the money is in smartphones. The iPhone may have "only" 11% of all mobile subscriptions, but when it comes to 2 year contracts nothing even compares. T-Mobile didn't get the iPhone because they weren't willing (or able) to pay Apple's incredibly high prices. Sprint felt it was a necessary investment to shore up their base, and Dan Hesse convinced the white knuckled board to drop $20 billion on iPhones.
C-Spire wants to transition to a high-margin smartphone carrier and responded to its most frequent customer requests. | |
| | | | | | | | Re: The deal won't be pulled by AT&T... I'm not sure what you are saying is misleading. I'm not talking about smartphones in general, although they still do not represent the majority of devices servicing the mobile phone subscriber base.
The part of their income that carriers care most about is their contract revenue. Given that they can get the data component of that revenue from a Blackberry, Android, Windows or iPhone device there is no special reason why selling an iPhone is any more effective than any other smartphone. Of course, carrying the iPhone does prevent contracts going elsewhere because of the customer's specific desire to own one...but that is where the significance of the 11% penetration comes in.
I was simply saying that the previous poster's argument (ie. AT&T probably paid to prevent TM from getting the iPhone to influence TM customer opinion in favor of the deal) did hold up to scrutiny.
There is nothing misleading about the dearth of comment about the iPhone in the TM forum. Frankly the absence of posts surprises even me.
You are right that Apple were asking more than TM were able to pay. Because DT are running TM USA as a "discontinued operation", they can't put up more money to buy into the iPhone than can be recovered over the remaining period of their ownership. Apple clearly can't/won't accommodate that limitation, which is a more accurate way of characterizing their issue with TM's future. | |
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| | I'm not so sure it's dead Yes, the deal to swallow T-Mobile whole may in fact be dead, but there are other ways to accomplish the same thing. This is what AT&T might try to do:
1. Enter into a spectrum-sharing deal with T-Mobile. Essentially, both companies' customers could roam on either network, at least on GSM. 3G is a problem because of incompatible bands, but there's no problem with GSM roaming.
2. Start buying unused spectrum from T-Mobile. Start out in more rural areas so it's less likely anyone will notice and complain.
3. Start buying small T-Mobile markets, especially in areas with a regional competitor, so there won't be as much of a competitive shift by losing a player.
4. Work with DT to harmonize bands. That means T-Mobile's 1700 3G goes away and gets replaced by LTE. At the same time, T-Mobile will start selling phones that work on AT&T's 3G and LTE bands.
5. T-Mobile will raise its prices to at least match AT&T's prices. At the same time, those harmonized phones will s-l-o-w-l-y roll out, but they won't come out fast enough to allow everyone to get one. And the price hike might even come first, just for good measure.
6. Once enough markets have been sold off to AT&T, T-Mobile will be a shell of its former self. And, with its higher prices, fewer and fewer people will want to use it. It'll be a carrier on a downward slide.
7. AT&T will make another offer for a smaller and less viable T-Mobile. Naturally, DT will accept, and it will be pitched to regulators as a way to put the assets of a dying carrier to good use. As for the loss of competition, well, it's obvious that the market couldn't support the existing number of carriers, as evidenced by T-Mobile's troubles. And, with luck, by this time there may be a more friendly administration in office.
The deal might take a bit longer this way, but, in the meantime, T-Mobile's frequencies will have been reconfigured to match AT&T's, which had to be done anyway, and prices will have been raised to match AT&T's, so there will be fewer customers potentially grandfathered on cheaper plans. And, if AT&T and DT really wanted to get rid of those customers, DT could simply shut down T-Mobile right before the new buyout deal is announced. Customers would be allowed to leave without an ETF, which means no grandfathered customers, and it has the added benefit of making T-Mobile look like a dead carrier, which all but assures the deal of going through.
You read it here first, folks. | |
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See 7 replies to this post | |
| | | | Re: 6 billion USD worth of spectrum, roaming and cash! No cause for excitement. The compensation is to go directly to Deutsche Telekom (DT) and doesn't have to be used by the TM USA business. While the spectrum can't be used overseas, it is possible that it could be sold on to other carriers and the proceeds directed to DT as well. Certainly, the $3 billion cash component will be used by DT to bolster the depleted revenue they have experienced over the last 2+ years while TM USA subscriptions have been in constant decline.
said by ConstantineM:I'm a T-Mobile USA customer, and I'm very excited about the 5 to 6 billion USD worth of spectrum, roaming and cash from AT&T to improve our most affordable 3.75G network. 
The deal has been dead since long ago; I'm surprised people didn't believe it's not going to go through.
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| | | Reviews:
 ·Google Voice
·Junction Networks
·Callcentric
 ·T-Mobile US
 ·AT&T U-Verse
| Re: 6 billion USD worth of spectrum, roaming and cash! I'd be surprised if DT takes out all of the cash for itself, without any extra T-Mo USA investment, or would even think about selling the spectrum gained. Yes, they do want out of the US market, but not at any cost. They wouldn't purposefully sabotage their own prior investment to get a short-term gain. They're not AT&T. I'm willing to bet that a noticeable amount of those 5 to 6 billions would end up in the T-Mobile USA budget for network improvements, including some future LTE plans.
In the long term, however, the only way to get T-Mobile USA out of the downturn is an LTE network supported by iPhone. Funny how nowadays a phone manufacturer can decide the fate of a major nationwide carrier!
We, as consumers, can only hope that the industry will sort out the recently-reported discrepancies about the incompatible LTE bands / networks / handsets, even within continents and within frequency bands that supposedly seem similar; otherwise, there'd be a real mess indeed.
Funny how GSM only has two bands in NA, plain and simple; UMTS — 3; LTE — hmm, seemingly AT&T and VZ use the same 700 MHz band, yet their LTE handsets managed to still be incompatible, since different parts of the band are used. WTF? | |
| | | | | | Re: 6 billion USD worth of spectrum, roaming and cash! I think we will have to agree to disgree here, Constantine.
As a long-standing TM customer, I've closely observed how TM's management, at the behest of Deutsche Telekom, has done everything in its power to bolster short-term revenue over the last 6-12 months at the expense of the longer term security of the business.
They've been caught short on this approach because the shrinking prospect of a deal, if it is to happen at all, is getting pushed further and further back. As a result, they've had to make some recent moves to assuage their deeply pissed off customer base. Minor stuff nonetheless.
I don't see any hint that they are investing anything in the company which will not yield a return on investment before their expected departure date. Running the company as a "discontinued operation", as DT are doing, requires that they only make investments which will clearly return money to their stockholders. They'll need to see the post-AT&T market value of the company before any investment decision can be made.
Until AT&T stepped in, this whole adventure added up to a huge loss for DT. They poured $55 billion in purchase cost and assumed debt when they acquired the company 10 years ago. I saw a report of analysis from a private investment bank some months ago that said that, if they cleared the $39 billion deal with AT&T, DT would walk away with a TOTAL profit of around $700m over the whole lifetime of the deal.
Until AT&T stepped in, they were at the table with Sprint discussing a deal probably worth around 60% of what AT&T offered. That's the measure of the loss that DT were willing to take.
DT are not exactly in the most robust health over in Europe and they need funds from divesting TM USA to bankroll their necessary network upgrades over there. Because of the commercial timelines impacting that, I don't think they have the luxury of sitting out the situation in the USA and investing in TM's future until the "right price" comes along again.
Don't get me wrong, I think it would be good if they did, but they would have to do a lot in a relatively short space of time to get on board with LTE competitively, and DT have studiously avoided that kind of investment commitment here in the past.
I guess we can only wait and see.
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| | | | | | | Re: 6 billion USD worth of spectrum, roaming and cash! You've done your homework on TM, and I agree with most of your statements. Who do you see gobbling up TM? Or will they liquidate? | |
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 pnh102Reptiles Are Cuddly And PrettyPremium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD | Dies? Yeah Right They'll build a new, far more powerful Death Star next time around... and yet, it will still have a single point of failure.
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"Net Neutrality" zealots - the people you can thank for your capped Internet service. | |
| deadzonedPremium
join:2005-04-13
Baton Rouge, LA | ... Would have been nice if at&t would have just spent all that money on their network to make it less crappy.
I mean c'mon! LTE? Really? at&t still has a terrible 3G network to deal with first! Their plan to charge us 200 dollars a pop for the privilege of using our broadband connection to take strain off of their crappy-ass network seems to be failing. | |
| | | | Re: ... You'd think they ought to do that, but...
...they don't really have to work as hard on their network if they can eliminate a competitor.
And there's another bonus here. As the only national GSM network left standing, they'd get all the roaming revenue from overseas travelers coming here. And, although VZW has hybrid CDMA/GSM phones, not all are, so, if you want to be able to have most any phone work internationally, your only national carrier would be AT&T. | |
| | | clone
join:2000-12-11
Portage, IN | Re: ... said by ISurfTooMuch:You'd think they ought to do that, but...
...they don't really have to work as hard on their network if they can eliminate a competitor.
And there's another bonus here. As the only national GSM network left standing, they'd get all the roaming revenue from overseas travelers coming here. And, although VZW has hybrid CDMA/GSM phones, not all are, so, if you want to be able to have most any phone work internationally, your only national carrier would be AT&T.
I agree, but LTE is changing that. And most international travelers won't have whatever VZW dumbphones/low-end smartphones that don't have world capability. The iPhone 4S being a CDMA/GSM world phone hybrid really does kind of change things for AT&T. | |
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| | | How can they charge to use your own wifi?
I've got unlocked phones I can use on wifi with NO network and no SIM. | |
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Reviews:
·CableOne
·AT&T Wireless Br..
| Dropping my AT&T Landline This is the only way to get their attention is to cut services.
Just received my Ooma Telo device and next year I will go somewhere else for cell phone service. They have 39 Billion to buy T-Mobile and they never think about upgrading their network first and replacing DSL with fibre networks going to the home. | |
| | | | Re: Dropping my AT&T Landline And what's VZ's excuse on moving away from DSL? They'll never build out into any new years. So T is just as bad as VZ. | |
| | | Reviews:
·Comcast
| Re: Dropping my AT&T Landline Because VZ wanted to move away from horribly-expensive-to-maintain *copper* - and they still do.
Union-friendly politicians see copper serving customers as a labor safety-net *because* it's such a bear to maintain compared to fiber - not because it will save those same customers any money. (As the copper portion of VZ's network inevitably declines in capability, the M&R costs will only increase - how does that help customers any?)
xDSL is still going away for *all* of VZ - whether you are served by FIOS or not. | |
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| | It isn't dead This deal isn't dead. Money talks in Washington.
You're just watching the politicians theater right now. Once they have extracted a bit more cash and put on a show of caring, the deal will go through. There will be some sort of story of vague ATT concessions held up as a cover. | |
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6 billion USD worth of spectrum, roaming and cash!
