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Verizon Chief Defends AT&T-T-Mobile Merger
The proposed merger of AT&T with T-Mobile doesn't impress everyone as a good idea; in particular, Sprint has filed suit to stop the merger, and while hardly a disinterested party, they're not alone in claiming that the resulting megacompany would harm customers. Verizon is taking a different tack; tekgoblin passes along this excerpt: "Verizon Communications chief executive Lowell McAdam has announced that he is supporting the AT&T T-Mobile merger. He warned that the Government has no choice but to let the deal go though unless they want to fix the current spectrum problems. He went on to say 'We need to be very thoughtful on what the impacts would be to the overall industry if this is a way to regulate the industry without actually passing regulation.' The current telcos need more wireless spectrum to continue expanding and operating efficiently so they have resorted to acquiring other companies."
So for us poor bastards on T-Mobile it seems that our fate is either
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
We're ready for less competition! Bring it on!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Looks like he hasn't been keeping up with the latest reports; indicating that AT&T is secretly trying to SELL spectrum to smaller operators in order to get support for the merger. Sounds like they have plenty already. (this was discussed on /.)
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
It would give Verizon the go-ahead to gobble up Sprint in, say, a hostile takeover, leaving only AT&T and Verizon on the playing field. A 2-company oligopoly can price gouge more easily than a 4-company oligopoly.
I am officially gone from
Never trust industries to regulate themselves when it comes to public utilities.
Verizon knows that rates industry wide will increase. Period End of story. Nothing to do with spectrum and ridiculous to think Verizon's got some soft spot in its heart for AT&T's (fabricated) spectrum woes. Give me a break....
Looks like Verizon is posturing for its plan to merge with Sprint. No no mergers are the only way we can keep up with customer demand. I mean you can't expect us to spend profits on upgrading our network. That would be silly.
If we want big Telco to keep expanding we have to let them merge. But maybe it would be better to say Verizon and AT&T you're big enough. There is nothing out there that says it is the governments responsibility to ensure that companies can grow indefinitely. If letting the merger go through raises anti-trust concern then, well maybe they've gotten as big as they should get.
How can Verizon buy Sprint if AT&T isn't allowed to buy T-Mobile?
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
It is good for Verizon, because it gets rid of another competitor. They can raise rates more without another decent competitor to keep them in check.
They also figure, probably rightly so, that a lot of TMobile customers will leave when it happens, giving Verison more.
Then ATT will continue doing the only thing they know how to do, and that is to keep getting worse than they already are, which will drive even more customers away with fewer competitors for them to go to.
More and more customers for Verizon all around, with higher and higher rates.
Win win.
ATT and now Verizon are telling us that consolidating the wireless market and discontinuing land lines will be good for the consumer. That sounds like the stuff we were told before we gave up protecting our domestic manufacturers and made it tax advantageous to manufacture in other countries and ship it back here. I still hear that giant sucking sound every afternoon. But I digress. What we really need is use the Sherman Antitrust Act to break ATT and Verizon into 3 phone companies each like we did with ATT in the 1980s. That benefited both shareholders and consumers immensely, and in fact put telecommunications innovation on steroids. If we fail stop the trend of consolidation, we will all pay more and get less.
Maybe for AT&T part of the issue is spectrum space, but believing the FCC has a binary choice ultimatum of either allowing more spectrum to be auctioned or allowing the AT&T&T merger to go through is complete nonsense. Lowell sounds like a 4-year-old here demanding that they have to do one or the other. The reason Verizon is interested in seeing it go through is A) a merger rejection precedent would be bad for them and B) AT&T is already a clumsy behemoth (even VZW looks good in comparison) and the inevitable fumbled integration is likely to result in a big migration of T-Mobile customers to VZW who will go anywhere but to AT&T.
In any case, it's clear from a mile away that the main goal here from AT&T's standpoint is to capture customers from T-mobile and bump up their ARPU (Average Revenue Per User, the gold standard of the telecom business). It's sad when your brand-name is so tainted that you have to change your name a couple times (SBC, I'm looking at you) and still resort to literally buying customers to expand your business.
Hey Lowell McAdam, You are saying that in order to expand you and AT&T needs to buy other companies to get more spectrum. So when they purchase T-Mobile and you purchase Sprint(for more spectrum) of course. What happens to the marketplace when only two players are left?. What happens to customers ability to chose? What happens to the choices of phones? Remember when iPhone was the only decent smartphone AT&T offered? What happens to unlimited wireless? Since AT&T decided to drop unlimited and you decided to follow suit leaving Sprint as the only true unlimited carrier. I don't buy your spectrum argument. I think you are licking your chops at the ability to drive up prices due to lack of consumer choice and nickel and dime us to death with overage charges. We do not want a duopoly on communications in America.
I say we let them merge, then bust AT&T up again into 7 little companies to see who gobbles who up. The prices for competition will be good for about 5 - 6 years and we will all get to see some good commercials and not to mention some really cool logos! It's the new way of entertaining the rich and the poor can sit helplessly while they are brainwashed into believing one company is actually better than another...
The FCC needs to fix this. These companies having to invest billions to own a radio frequency is annoying. My devices having to support T-Mobile 3G or AT&T 3G is annoying. These spectrum issues need to get addressed since they limit competition and only the super companies can afford to compete.
AT&T has plenty of spectrum. What they don't have is connective infrastructure. I constantly have AT&T signal but data just won't go through because the towers' routers are overloaded. AT&T needs to take the billions it is trying to spend buying T-Mobile to add bandwidth.
"We can categorically state we have not released man-eating badgers into the area." - UK military spokesman, July 2007
...After all, they're next!
(and then finally, AT&T will be back together)
you cannot stop us from buy up Sprint.
"With less competition across the board, we can all charge higher prices. It's a win-win!"
Honestly, with the cost of internet (I have only one choice in my city of 200K) Comcast charges me, plus the third-party applications to allow telephone calls to wi-fi devices (skype, talkatone, etc.) and free texting, I will eliminate my cellphone before most other expenses. No, I don't need to be accessible all the time and kind of loathe that aspect of modern society, as of late. If you really want to get a hold of me, you know what to do.......
No sig for you! Come back one year!
Where else will all the T-Mobile customers go?
Sprint? Stay with AT&T? lol
Because that then opens the door for Verizon to purchase Sprint so that there will be even LESS competition.
giggity
"Collusion and price-fixing are so much friendlier with two. :)" - Lowell McAdam
I have a QUAD band GSM phone. Do you know how many bands are actually used? Only two. 850 and 1900 in my area. Do you know who provides service on the other two bands att doesnt offer in my area? T-Mobile does. I have 0 signal in a lot of places I go mostly because of buildings and shit, but when I'm in my own backyard, have 1 bar of service and 3g is totally unusable and I have to force to edge to get it to work? Total bs, especially considering my friend who has T-Mobile has 4-5 bars of service in the same place.
So let me get this straight. Instead of trying to innovate and develop new tech to use the existing spectrum you have. You instead want to gobble up competitors for there spectrum and continue to not spend any money to upgrade, yet at the same time increase prices on everyone.
Ya remind me again how that's good for me the customer?
Immoral corporate greed and inane douchebaggery headed for a photo finish!
It's easier to collude when you've got fewer competitors to collude with.
Its easier to conspire with one company than with two when fixing prices and overcharging for services...
As a Verizon customer, I often wonder why my $99/mo plan costs me $160...
"There ought to be limits to freedom." -George W. Bush
Chewbacca is a wookie living on Endor. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, that does not make sense.
"The current telcos need more wireless spectrum to continue expanding and operating efficiently so they have resorted to acquiring other companies."
Or give them all the same restrictions do they can battle it out on price and not on coverage. A level playing field would let competition work better.
This is Verizon basically saying "We want to be able to "merge" with Sprint in a few years so if we fight them on this they're gonna fight us on that"
Personally I'd rather have my idiots at home glued to the TV than out doing idiotic things
Of course Sprint isn't disinterested! They're bringing suit, which requires that they have standing. In other words, if they *were* disinterested, then the judge would have thrown out the case.