Houston based Crown Castle has reached an agreement with T-Mobile to purchase the rights to approximately 7,200 towers in a deal worth $2.4 billion in cash. The not uncommon move gives Crown Castle exclusive rights to own and operate the T-Mobile towers for a contract span of 28 years, giving T-Mobile an additional cash infusion to help fund the company's upcoming LTE upgrade. The new cash comes on the heels of the $6 billion in cash, spectrum and roaming arrangements T-Mobile received after their failed merger with AT&T earlier this year. T-Mobile will be installing new equipment at 37,000 cell sites and refarming spectrum in order to launch LTE sometime in 2013.
There's an error in your piece.... From the earlier linked article:
"Now that the AT&T deal is officially dead (unless they refile a new deal next year) T-Mobile's talking a little bit about that $4 billion consolation package they'll get from AT&T. As we've previously discussed, that package includes a combination of cash, spectrum, and network roaming deals both companies are talking more about now that the deal is officially in the grave. In a statement issued by T-Mobile owner Deutsche Telekom, the company notes that in addition to $3 billion in cash, T-Mobile gets a new seven-year roaming deal with AT&T -- and some delicious new spectrum to help with its 4G expansion ambitions:"
Its amazing how this company is now trying to turn around once the merger was killed off.. They where acting like the merger was some sorta bailout or something till it all crumbled thanks to public outcry and a few people in the proper places with a knowledge of common sense..
This is true... But if they weren't ignoring customers and lacking on the build out side they might of not been soo bad off..
I think if you look at how the merger deal was priced, IF it went through, It was very much in Deutsche Telekom's advantage to have T-MO valued as high as possible leading up to regulatory approval. That high value (partly due to chopping customer service and everything else) is part of why the final compasation for disapproval was so high. Deutsche Telekom really burned AT&T on this one.
If you mean AT&T's attempted purchase/takeover, that is much different than finding out you must continue on alone but you suddenly have $8.4B towards the expandsion you needed in the first place to remain viable in 3rd place but still/soon to be top tier, rather than a niche player in limited markets.
It all most like T-mo/Deutsche Telekom hoped/maybe even pushed this for this outcome.
They're getting $1000 per month per tower for the duration of the lease...right now. And it's a lease...they still own the towers at the lease's end, and Crown Castle now has to do all maintenance.
When Sprint sold its towers (not leased, sold) to TowerCo, it got a deal that valued each tower at quite a bit less than with this deal. Then again, 4G wasn't big in '08.
I don't see how 4G would have to be that big back in 2008 in regards to what Sprint got. TowerCo probably offered Sprint a price and they took it. TMO-USA probably held out for the best deal.
They still have a long way to go on pricing, QOS, and customer service, when I left them years back they were worse than sprint
Their unlimited pricing is competitive with Sprint's and their data network, at least, is better. Much better. Their limited data plans are competitive with VZW's and "AT&T"s, and their data performance, in many (most?) major metro areas may be better than "AT&T"s.
First I've heard about issues with their QOS.
Hopefully they'll get their customer service back up to the levels it was at prior to "AT&T"s unsuccessful attempt to Borg them.
This deal "Reinforces Crown Castle's position as largest provider of wireless infrastructure in the US" and comes on the heels of a new CEO for TMo, John Legere named last week.