Analyst Estimates AT&T Needs To Spend $5B To Catch Up

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday January 20, 2010 @02:35AM from the connection-lost dept.

itwbennett writes "The public's perception of AT&T's network is poor and declining, apparently because of real shortcomings when compared with Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel,' says Gerard Hallaren, director of research at TownHall Investment Research. 'AT&T's capital expenditures on its wireless network from 2006 through September 2009 totaled about $21.6 billion, compared with $25.4 billion for Verizon and $16 billion for Sprint (including Sprint's investments in WiMax operator Clearwire). Over that time, Verizon has spent far more per subscriber: $353, compared with $308 for AT&T,' Hallaren said. 'Even Sprint has outspent AT&T per subscriber, laying out $310 for network capital expenditure.' All this means AT&T has a choice, says Hallaren: 'spend or suffer.'"

2 of 187 comments (clear)

Re:Sprint? by bcong · 2010-01-20 02:52 · Score: 5, Informative

I've never understood while Sprint get's bashed every time they are compared to other providers. I've been with Sprint for ~10 years and they have always provided me with good service and coverage with reasonable rates. I can not remember the last time I had no service or a call was dropped. Maybe it's because I live in a metro area, but I have nothing bad to say about them.
Re:considering the 3g maps by LearningHard · 2010-01-20 05:35 · Score: 5, Informative

VZW is on EV-DO Rev. A which supports 3.1Mb transfer speeds NOT 2-300kbps and is MUCH faster than EDGE. HSDPA actually supports up to 18Mb not the 20 you claim. However as seen below you will never see anything close tot hat in the real world.
Also PC World did a piece in June comparing REAL world transfer speeds (http://www.pcworld.com/zoom?id=167391&page=1&zoomIdx=1)
AT&T averaged: 717 Kb/sec
Sprint averaged: 745 Kb/sec
VZW averaged: 890 Kb/sec
For reliability...
AT&T: 66%
Sprint: 84%
VZW: 83%
Please get out of here with your misinformation.