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T-Mobile's Disruption Shows AT&T Merger Skepticism Was Warranted

Two years ago I was busy debunking AT&T's claims that eliminating T-Mobile from the market would somehow magically improve competition. The deal was blocked, and now T-Mobile is successfully disrupting the wireless industry on numerous fronts, from their new Jump device payment plans (very quickly copied by their three competitors) to this week's interesting decision to offer free international data roaming.

Ryan Chittum at the Columbia Journalism Review argues that T-Mobile's recent successes (they're now taking two customers from AT&T for every one customer AT&T takes from them) highlight why antitrust enforcement remains important in an age where there's an endless drum beat for weaker regulators and deregulation:

quote:
Here we have an extremely valuable lesson in why we need antitrust enforcement. Had AT&T absorbed T-Mobile two years ago, there’s zero chance any of these big changes would have been made. In the meantime, T-Mobile is already putting heat on the would-be duopolists at AT&T and Verizon. It’s gaining market share, reversing what had been a downtrend and further gains will put pressure on competitors to adopt its customer-friendly practices.
Many analysts believe that a big reason for AT&T's deal getting shot down was quite simply hubris; the company made an endless series of unsubstantiated claims contradicted by their own internal documents, while their use of astroturf (paying hundreds of random organizations like the U.S. Cattlemen’s Association to parrot support for the merger) put a particularly bad taste in regulators' mouths.

AT&T's hubris had another major impact for T-Mobile and its customers: the break up fee AT&T agreed to (assuming the deal was a sure thing) gifted T-Mobile with billions in additional spectrum, cash, and roaming agreements. While AT&T these days doesn't much like to talk about the failed deal (AT&T's cocky commentary from last year is notably absent the last few months), wireless customers are certainly enjoying the fruit of AT&T's missteps.
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Steve B
Premium Member
join:2004-08-02
Auburn, WA

4 edits

Steve B

Premium Member

Well Of Course....

Is anyone surprised? LOL

I'm with AT&T and have no plans to change. I have bounced around the carriers like some wireless carrier w***e. I kept coming back to AT&T and so I'm here to stay. T-Mobile for all their "disruptions", their network "quality" is lacking. Of the times I had them, I kept getting long-delayed text messages, missed calls (people would call but, my phone would NOT ring). I would only get notified of such calls if the person that was calling me, told me later in person or if they left a voicemail. That was unacceptable. I turned in a troubleshooting ticket but, they were taking SO LONG, that I gave up and ported out. By that time, it was clear to even techs, that it was something on the network side but, because I ported out, they just closed the ticket and didn't finish work (yes, I called after I ported out to check on that because it would've affected other customers).

Verizon is good, but, not worth the nickel and dime games they've done to me when I had them. Sprint is simply a no go with me because of their customer service issues and their network wasn't all that far reaching for me for when I was out and about.

AT&T has been a good "middle of the road" for me and I'm happy. They're not perfect but, the few in-frequent quirks are tolerable.

A little more back on topic, I'm glad to see T-Mobile taking these steps. My hope is that such behavior will trickle through the other carriers at some point.

BlackICE
@rr.com

1 recommendation

BlackICE

Anon

Re: Well Of Course....

No, but that won't stop degregulators and lobbists from denying facts.

MovieLover76
join:2009-09-11
Cherry Hill, NJ
(Software) pfSense
Asus RT-AC68
Asus RT-AC66

MovieLover76 to Steve B

Member

to Steve B
AT&T is my second choice in carrier's, because T-mobile is good where I live on the East Coast, but I know t-mobile is coverage is very location specific. I actually get better quality voice calls on T-mobile than AT&T, but when people are concerned about coverage I suggest AT&T prepaid or one of their mvno's.

Much better deal than Verizon, and Sprint's network is crap where I live and from what I've read most places.

In the end the competition is good for all of us, T-mobile is good where I live so I am their customer and I like supporting the carrier that is upsetting the would be duopoly.

ColeC
@cox.net

1 recommendation

ColeC to Steve B

Anon

to Steve B
Sprints reach and network quality may not be up to par, but the customer service has gone from worst to best recently. I have had need to call them 3 times this week and i had a real person on the phone each time in less than one minute, one of them was even in an office in my area (Southeast Virginia) and knew exactly how to help me. I have stuck with them so far as my only other choice is Verizon and I despise that company, where I actually live, out in the sticks T-Mo and ATT have no signal at all.
Crookshanks
join:2008-02-04
Binghamton, NY

1 recommendation

Crookshanks to Steve B

Member

to Steve B
said by Steve B:

Of the times I had them, I kept getting long-delayed text messages, missed calls (people would call but, my phone would NOT ring). I would only get notified of such calls if the person that was calling me, told me later in person or if they left a voicemail. That was unacceptable.

Your experience is rather atypical, which area was this? I had T-Mo for more than two years, in an area (Binghamton) they only served as an afterthought, and I had no problems whatsoever with their network.... when I had signal that is.

The biggest problem I had with T-Mo was the lack of signal outside of the urban area/major highways, and the occasional issue holding signal while indoors. 1900mhz just doesn't compare to 850mhz in that regard.

Never had capacity issues or anything of the sort with them. When I had access to their native network the quality was every bit as good as Verizon. In fact, call quality was better than the big boys in those days, because T-Mo used full rate GSM while AT&T was running half rate and Verizon was playing with the very lossy early CDMA codecs.

Steve B
Premium Member
join:2004-08-02
Auburn, WA

Steve B

Premium Member

Re: Well Of Course....

said by Crookshanks:

said by Steve B:

Of the times I had them, I kept getting long-delayed text messages, missed calls (people would call but, my phone would NOT ring). I would only get notified of such calls if the person that was calling me, told me later in person or if they left a voicemail. That was unacceptable.

Your experience is rather atypical, which area was this? I had T-Mo for more than two years, in an area (Binghamton) they only served as an afterthought, and I had no problems whatsoever with their network.... when I had signal that is.

The biggest problem I had with T-Mo was the lack of signal outside of the urban area/major highways, and the occasional issue holding signal while indoors. 1900mhz just doesn't compare to 850mhz in that regard.

Never had capacity issues or anything of the sort with them. When I had access to their native network the quality was every bit as good as Verizon. In fact, call quality was better than the big boys in those days, because T-Mo used full rate GSM while AT&T was running half rate and Verizon was playing with the very lossy early CDMA codecs.

I live in Seattle, WA.

SteelerRaw
@216.52.185.x

SteelerRaw

Anon

It should be mentioned...

That a large part of the reason that t-mobile is currently able to thrive and be disruptive is due to the massive cash and spectrum infusion that they were gifted as a result of the AT&T merger falling through. Had AT&T not been so cocky and stupid by agreeing to such an exorbitant breakup fee, it'd likely be a different story for t-mobile now. As it is though, it's fun to see the changes that t-mobile is bringing to the industry. I'm curious to see what they might do next.

MovieLover76
join:2009-09-11
Cherry Hill, NJ
(Software) pfSense
Asus RT-AC68
Asus RT-AC66

1 recommendation

MovieLover76

Member

Re: It should be mentioned...

Very true, T-mobile and the country got lucky, with AT&T's blunder.
Even people who aren't customers are benefiting because of the competition.

Verizon may be largely ignoring T-mobile, but Sprint takes note of T-mobile and AT&T is actively trying to compete against T-mobile, which has lead to quite a few good deals on AT&T prepaid.
GoPhone, AIO and the mvnos.

djdanska
Rudie32
Premium Member
join:2001-04-21
San Diego, CA

djdanska

Premium Member

Re: It should be mentioned...

said by MovieLover76:

Verizon may be largely ignoring T-mobile

Historically, Verizon Wireless doesn't pay too much attention to T-Mobile. Just ignoring them, cause you know the thinking.. "It's t-mobile. Good luck getting service" thinking. But the fact that they are making ANY public statements is a sign t-mobile might just be a serious threat

RR Conductor
Ridin' the rails
Premium Member
join:2002-04-02
Redwood Valley, CA
ARRIS SB6183
Netgear R7000

RR Conductor

Premium Member

Re: It should be mentioned...

Not until they get rid of all their GPRS and EDGE, which most of their network (physical here, not POP's). Come up here to rural NW CA, EDGE everywhere with them, but Verizon and U.S. Cellular are LTE, and AT&T is HSPA+ w/EB, with LTE being as far north as Geyserville. T-Mobile may be a threat in urban areas, but in suburban, rural and smaller town America, not at all, we are referred to by their CEO as "those dustbowl states", in other words we don't count to them.
TBBroadband
join:2012-10-26
Fremont, OH

TBBroadband to SteelerRaw

Member

to SteelerRaw
They also got a nice spectrum deal with METRO which will help them as well.

winsyrstrife
River City Bounce
Premium Member
join:2002-04-30
Brooklyn, NY

winsyrstrife

Premium Member

It was super effective!

Well played DT, well played...

New TMobile
@verizon.net

New TMobile

Anon

Quality of service

As someone who switched to T-Mobile in the last two weeks I can say that I am a VERY satisfied customer. I live a good 20+ miles outside of Pittsburgh and am able to get LTE with a speed of 15.5!
My iPhone 5S is paired with my Acura while driving and I don't see less than 3 bars and usually 4-5 the vast majority of the time. And then I am traveling on business in about a month and now I don't have to pay for an international plan to use my phone there at no additional cost!

jseymour
join:2009-12-11
Waterford, MI

1 recommendation

jseymour

Member

Re: Quality of service

I was expecting relatively poor service, here in S.E. Michigan, from all the dire warnings I read on-line. The reality: My service has been pretty good, so far. Hit the way far north and west fringes of what might be considered the "Metro-Detroit" area, and gone half-way across Ontario. No persistent problems. On average: Better coverage than I'd been getting from Sprint, lately.

Jim

djdanska
Rudie32
Premium Member
join:2001-04-21
San Diego, CA

djdanska

Premium Member

Re: Quality of service

They have made a lot of improvements but it will take time to get away from the "crappy service" or the boost mobile thinking.

amarryat
Verizon FiOS
join:2005-05-02
Marshfield, MA

amarryat to New TMobile

Member

to New TMobile
Are you northwest? I was there on business a few weeks ago and also at LTE around Monaca. However in Shippingport, there was no signal at all, and both AT&T and Verizon at full signals there. I called T-Mobile, spoke to their technical support, told them where I could see a tower that was most likely the location of the AT&T and Verizon cells, and they said their field guys would be out there to install a cell. We'll see........
tired_runner
Premium Member
join:2000-08-25
CT
·Frontier FiberOp..

tired_runner

Premium Member

The Dutch played Chess with AT&T....

... and got themselves a checkmate.

AT&T didn't consider what would happen when enough noise would be made about the merger. It's what happens when you rely on keeping some politicians on your payroll.

I'm personally happy T-Mobile stuck around. They're simply the best deal in town and the network quality for the most is acceptable.

jseymour
join:2009-12-11
Waterford, MI

jseymour

Member

Re: The Dutch played Chess with AT&T....

The Dutch? ITYM "The Germans." T-Mobile is, or was, anyway, owned by Deutsche Telekom, a German company.

Jim

n2jtx
join:2001-01-13
Glen Head, NY

n2jtx

Member

Would Switch Back

I was with T-Mobile from September 2005 to March 2012. I wound up on Sprint because my company gave me an iPhone 4S and pays for the service. It became ridiculous carrying two phones so I ported my T-Mobile number to the iPhone and that became my only cell phone. My only regret is I am not a fan of CDMA2000 and the Sprint data service is worse than horrible. If I had to take over my cell service payments, I would switch back to T-Mobile in heartbeat. With one exception, I never had problems with T-Mobile service here on the east coast. I did have one problem where roaming on AT&T stopped working in central New York back around 2009-2010. I called T-Mobile and they lied to me telling me there must be a network problem and they would look into it (turns out their roaming agreement with AT&T had been terminated but they were not telling customers that). Next time I went through, T-Mobile had native coverage throughout that area so I assume they just decided to go without coverage a few months until their network came online. Unfortunately they could not bother to be honest and tell me that.

jseymour
join:2009-12-11
Waterford, MI

jseymour

Member

Hope TMO Can Pull It Off

Moved to T-Mobile about two months ago, after having been with Sprint for 15 years. Made the move as a result of Sprint's coverage actually getting worse, lately, and T-Mobile's new way of doing business. So far it's working out well.

I'm praying T-Mobile can pull off the combination of offering killer plans, upgrading their existing network and expanding their native coverage. That will be a difficult hat trick to pull off.

You can bet VZW and "at&t," in particular, will do everything in their power to kill T-Mobile now. TMO is being disruptive. (Sprint used to be disruptive. Now they're little different from the old school guys.) We've been getting royally screwed on wireless, here in the U.S. TMO is un-screwing us. Those old school TelCom companies won't like that at all.

Jim

graycorgi
Premium Member
join:2004-02-23

graycorgi

Premium Member

Re: Hope TMO Can Pull It Off

Sprint's biggest problem right now is their board. The board that made very dumb decisions like turning down the CEO's idea of buying MetroPCS, a purchase which made sense because they were CDMA. I really hope the new owners throw them out and put people in who know what they're doing. With the right leadership Sprint could offer what T-Mobile is and more.

Paladin
Sage of the light
join:2001-08-17
Chester, IL

Paladin

Member

Re: Hope TMO Can Pull It Off

SoftBank already turned over the board and most of the top level sales and marketing executives at Sprint. More changes are coming, including 6000 Clearwire towers in the process of being converted to TD-LTE from WiMax.

ProfitUP
@proxlabs.com

ProfitUP to jseymour

Anon

to jseymour
T-Mobiles profits and stock price is up significantly this year and it looks like they are doing very well in their turnaround. And their investment in infrastructure has increased as well. As LTE availability improves, they should get even more customers.
Cobra11M
join:2010-12-23
Mineral Wells, TX

Cobra11M

Member

Re: Hope TMO Can Pull It Off

at the rate they are going they can easily pay off the debt and expand coverage while also paying stock holders.., the company does show promise
axus
join:2001-06-18
Washington, DC

axus

Member

I guess 4 is the minimum number of competitors

Limit the market share of any company to 1/3, linearly increase the tax rate after that. Or you could just set tax rate exactly equal to market share. Imagine the legal fights that would ensue over that. Also, what if you create a new market, are you taxed at 100% until competitors show up?

Anyhows, keeping things competitive is hard, since there is a tendency toward monopoly. But we have to remain vigilant.
majortom1029
join:2006-10-19
Medford, NY

majortom1029

Member

hmm

I am with ATT right now. The only reason why I am with them is because I have the unlimited data. As soon as that goes away T-Mobile here I come.

Anon1000
@verizon.net

Anon1000

Anon

Re: hmm

You can get unlimited LTE data ($20/month) with T-Mobile right now and your overall bill will be less.
sandman_1
join:2011-04-23
11111

sandman_1

Member

Tmobile

Switched from Sprint to Tmobile sometime back and couldnt be happier. Tmobiles coverage in my area is great and so is the 4g hspa speed, 15mbps usually. Sprint just doesnt even compare in my area even though they are upgrading their network. The problem though, Sprint will still have plenty of dead spots for voice coverage because in most places they are not expanding that type of coverage. With Tmobile, I havent had a problem getting voice coverage even out in the boonies. I dont think I will ever go back to Sprint and I definitely wont go with the big two.

graycorgi
Premium Member
join:2004-02-23

graycorgi

Premium Member

Re: Tmobile

Unfortunately it is not like that everywhere. Take a drive from Johnson City, TN to Athens, OH for example. 5 hours of that drive you are roaming on AT&T on T-Mobile, where Sprint covers the entire way. Sprint is also putting voice on 800MHz which will help their dropped call problem. I think their only issue will be near the Canadian border due to regulations.

Sprint is slow as molasses but their coverage easily beats T-Mobile in my area and all areas surrounding. T-Mobile only has HSPA in Johnson City and Kingsport. Bristol, TN/VA, Greeneville, TN, Morristown, TN, many other markets are left on EDGE. Sprint has LTE in most of those areas now.

djdanska
Rudie32
Premium Member
join:2001-04-21
San Diego, CA

djdanska

Premium Member

Re: Tmobile

said by graycorgi:

Unfortunately it is not like that everywhere. Take a drive from Johnson City, TN to Athens, OH for example. 5 hours of that drive you are roaming on AT&T on T-Mobile, where Sprint covers the entire way. Sprint is also putting voice on 800MHz which will help their dropped call problem. I think their only issue will be near the Canadian border due to regulations.

Sprint is slow as molasses but their coverage easily beats T-Mobile in my area and all areas surrounding. T-Mobile only has HSPA in Johnson City and Kingsport. Bristol, TN/VA, Greeneville, TN, Morristown, TN, many other markets are left on EDGE. Sprint has LTE in most of those areas now.

This is true. T-Mobile isn't strong in that area. But, for many of us who don't travel there much, you have to think about the cost savings. aka "Is it worth slow speeds here but good at home but cost less"

graycorgi
Premium Member
join:2004-02-23

graycorgi

Premium Member

Re: Tmobile

Yep, it all comes down to where you will be using your phone often and how the service is in those places.
flyingjoey
join:2005-11-07
Jersey City, NJ

flyingjoey

Member

Free International Data

I really hope that other carriers follow TMo's steps and offer free international data. 20 dollars a meg or 300mb for 60 bucks is so outrages.

Paladin
Sage of the light
join:2001-08-17
Chester, IL

Paladin

Member

It's the coverage

T-Mobile can't disrupt in the long run if they don't do anything about the massive lack of coverage they have, especially in high speed data. They still have large sections of the country without HSPA 3G coverage let alone LTE. They can't show an honest map of what their LTE coverage is, and they've let rural areas that had LTE coverage under MetroPCS wither without integration into the T-Mobile network. AT&T and Verizon have no reason to be scared. Yet.

I'd be happy to consider T-Mobile in the long run, but there's no reason for me to do so when they can't do something basic like provide HSPA service where I live when AT&T and VZW provide LTE where I live. For all the money that the Bell duopoly spends on lobbying, they spend thousands of times over on their networks, and it shows. AT&T's coverage has improved by orders of magnitude the last three years, and Verizon has always been perhaps the best in the world at providing rural coverage. That coverage doesn't come cheap.

If a true wildcard exists it's SoftBank, the new owners of Sprint. They are deploying over the old Nextel and Clearwire spectrum at a rapid pace, and they will have the low spectrum and high spectrum to really hit hard.

Let's see what the reactions are here when SoftBank makes a bid to buy out TMUS. Karl would come out against that, right?

••••
Bob61571
join:2008-08-08
Washington, IL

Bob61571

Member

T-Mobile needs to work on their Illinois I-55 data coverage

RootMetrics.com shows what I have seen on my own T-Mobile phone.

Little data coverage between Chicago, Illinois and St. Louis, Missouri on I-55.
Phone coverage is OK, but once you get outside the 2 big metro areas, good luck pulling any data from T-Mobile. There's probably 225-250 miles of NO data coverage on T-Mobile on I-55(out of 300 between Chicago and St. Louis.).

Hard to believe, but true.
rmdir
join:2003-03-13
Chicago, IL

rmdir

Member

Re: T-Mobile needs to work on their Illinois I-55 data coverage

Don't know if it's changed, but big metro area coverage used to be bad too, which is why I finally went to VZW 2 years ago. I used to get dropped calls west of Chicago, going down 83 from EGV to south of 88. Tmobile CS was unable to help me, so I finally dumped them. I can see maybe not getting a signal in the middle of nowhere, but in Chicago??
corinthos
join:2007-10-09

corinthos

Member

Love tmobile

but know it only works on a city by city basis and hardly at all in places in between. Though my way around it is using google voice. I do all my sms through it then leave my phone at home and forward it to a prepaid phone if am going somewhere in BFE which is usually less than once a year.
I never have problems with it within the city limits of over 100,000 people though.

I hate AT&T so much that even if they were cheaper then I wouldn't get them.
BiggA
Premium Member
join:2005-11-23
Central CT

BiggA

Premium Member

Still not a player

T-Mobile still isn't a player, as their coverage sucks.

•••