AT&T to Acquire T-Mobile USA for $39 Billion

[ten-oak-druid]

It was rumored that Sprint might buy T-mobile. I wonder if this kills the Sprint iphone? If T-mobile and Sprint had joined, the customer base would have been larger.

The important issue to resolve is whether Catherine will do AT&T adds.

She'll look even better with an iphone in her hand.

 

[acidfast7]

Yeah, American service sucks, but much of that is to do with the low population densities across much of a huge country making the construction of the network ridiculously expensive. I wonder how good cell service is in rural areas of Europe.

I meant service on an options level. You still can't buy an unlocked iPhone without a contract. Rural areas in Scandinavia will be 80Mb/s by the end of the year (150Mb/s in urban areas), this is an area with less than 1/3 population density of California.

I just think the lack of choice will really hurt you guys.

 

[imutter]

Cool when is closing?

 

[mdlooker]

As a ATT customer, I surely hope this turns out for the best and I believe it will. To acquire a 4G LTE infrastructure already in motion and add to that infrastucture plus already having global accessability means some promising things down the road. I wouldn't dare jump ship just yet. Maybe it's just me though.

 

[uPhone]

Wait.

Isn't that iPhones and other smartphones don't get 3G because of some band frequency on T-Mobile's network?

What's up with that?

 

[mrpither]

Just as long as Carly Foulkes still does the commercials....I'm good.

she's probably a key component of this deal...

 

[hushmartin]

Hate to break it to you At&t bashers, but At&t does not compete with T-mobile. Att's competitor is Verizon; T-Mo is nothing but a discount alternative and has been for years. I'm betting that T-mo USA was about ready to flop and this was an effort to get out while they could minimize the damage to the parent company.

I foresee this raising prices for T-mo customers *eventually*, but those old plans will be grandfathered for a while. They'll have to select a new plan when they upgrade to a new handset, most likely. I don't expect it will make one whit of difference to At&t customers' prices. Signal might improve a whole lot on both networks though!

 

[nateo200]

Holy ****. This is big! I can see this boosting AT&T's capacity issues but not really there coverage, T-Mobile is literally all 1900Mhz and what AT&T really needs is 850Mhz spectrum or even just 700Mhz for LTE but thats another story. I say AT&T takes all that T-Mobile 1900Mhz GSM and turns it into HSPA+ and takes all that 1700 HSPA and turns it into euro esk 2100Mhz HSPA+. iPhone on AT&T would pwn verizon in urban areas as for rural I doubt that issue will change.... Next iPhone will have to support 1700HSPA if its any other way though...

If the two don't merge like Cingular and AT&T did then I say they offer reduced pricing/free roaming on each others 3G UMTS and GSM networks

Next up: Verizon buys Sprint.

That would be insanity both in a good and bad way. Sprint has MASSIVE amounts of spectrum make no mistake, that combined with verizon would create just ridiculous capacity. I don't think smartphone users could slow down that kind of power if they tried. A shame neither sprint nor verizon went for EvDO Rev B. though...

 

[Sixtafoua]

As a T-Mobile iPhone user, I hope this means I can upgrade to 4.3

 

[theturtle]

im just curious on what happens with the tmobile phones. Does that mean that all their current 3g phones will be worthless when they officially become att?

 

[hssky97]

That was most certainly unexpected....

 

[Small White Car]

I gotta say, I didn't see this coming.

I'm inclined to think this will be good for current at&t iPhone users. Service will improve and as for prices...well Verizon and at&t never cared what the other 2 charged anyway. They really just watched each other. So I don't think this will change anything there.

 

[Xavier]

Next up: Verizon buys Sprint.

Was thinking the same thing.

 

[andiwm2003]

Yeah, American service sucks, but much of that is to do with the low population densities across much of a huge country making the construction of the network ridiculously expensive. I wonder how good cell service is in rural areas of Europe.

the shoddy service in the US is not because of the low population density and the large area. Because most people would understand that you get spotty reception in dakota or utah. but the shoddy service is actually in the middle of big cities. Cambridge/Boston comes to mind.

The reason why the service is spotty is because there is no government oversight and no consumer protection in the US. If I had that quality of service in Europe that I have in Boston then I'm sure they would fine the hell out of the carriers and you would be entitled to suspend payments.

 

[johnnyrb]

AT&T and T-Mobile customers should see service improvements with improved voice quality due to increased cell tower density and broader network infrastructure. At closing, AT&T will immediately gain cell cites that would have taken 5 years to build otherwise.

With AT&T spending $36 billion for T-Mobile to gain the extra cell cites, how much longer will it take AT&T to update all cites from 3g to HSPA+ and LTE?

 

[cmfilms]

This should put an end to those horrible T-Mobile commercials that try to simultaneously rip-off and rip-on Apple's Get a Mac ads.

 

[thelonelylimo]

It was rumored that Sprint might buy T-mobile. I wonder if this kills the Sprint iphone?

hahaha... Sprint iPhone.

 

[tigres]

Hate to break it to you At&t bashers, but At&t does not compete with T-mobile. Att's competitor is Verizon; T-Mo is nothing but a discount alternative and has been for years. I'm betting that T-mo USA was about ready to flop and this was an effort to get out while they could minimize the damage to the parent company.

I foresee this raising prices for T-mo customers *eventually*, but those old plans will be grandfathered for a while. They'll have to select a new plan when they upgrade to a new handset, most likely. I don't expect it will make one whit of difference to At&t customers' prices. Signal might improve a whole lot on both networks though!

Come back here in a couple of years and report your new mobile GSM options. Ther is no way this is a good thing for 1.consumers. 2.competition 3.advancement

Banks will be at 5, communications at 2.

All hail collusion, fixed pricing, and monopolies.

 

[nfl46]

WOW! I totally didn't see this coming. I saw that Sprint was interested in buying T-Mobile, I didn't think AT&T would.

What's next? Verizon buys Sprint?

AT&T vs. Verizon in the US; wow!

 

[Small White Car]

im just curious on what happens with the tmobile phones. Does that mean that all their current 3g phones will be worthless when they officially become att?

The main reason to buy another carrier is to get more frequencies.

So I suspect that all past at&t phones and all past t-mobile phones will continue to work on this new at&t network the same as always.

What they WON'T do is gain much new coverage. But going forward most at&t phones will probably be tuned for more frequencies, meaning that future at&t phones will get wider coverage than current ones do.

But that's just a guess. The other thing they could do is turn all T-Mobile frequencies to LTE 4G and, yes, tell you all to get new 3G phones (for the old at&t 3G network). That's another option.

 

[Al Coholic]

My question is - why did Apple not buy them and tell AT&T to pound sand?

Don't start this crap again. You know nothing.

 

[SAIRUS]

the shoddy service in the US is not because of the low population density and the large area. Because most people would understand that you get spotty reception in dakota or utah. but the shoddy service is actually in the middle of big cities. Cambridge/Boston comes to mind.

The reason why the service is spotty is because there is no government oversight and no consumer protection in the US. If I had that quality of service in Europe that I have in Boston then I'm sure they would fine the hell out of the carriers and you would be entitled to suspend payments.

EXACTLY!

If the govt were per say to take control and say same spectrums across all carriers, you suddenly take coverage out the scenario. GOOD! Then companies actually have to compete for consumers like they do in other countries in Europe and Asia (visiting India, I got some really cheap service).

 

[cmfilms]

the shoddy service in the US is not because of the low population density and the large area. Because most people would understand that you get spotty reception in dakota or utah. but the shoddy service is actually in the middle of big cities. Cambridge/Boston comes to mind.

The reason why the service is spotty is because there is no government oversight and no consumer protection in the US. If I had that quality of service in Europe that I have in Boston then I'm sure they would fine the hell out of the carriers and you would be entitled to suspend payments.

^^^This.

We need a consumer protection agency. Anyone who says different is either a billionaire or a chump.

 

[NAG]

the shoddy service in the US is not because of the low population density and the large area. Because most people would understand that you get spotty reception in dakota or utah. but the shoddy service is actually in the middle of big cities. Cambridge/Boston comes to mind.

The reason why the service is spotty is because there is no government oversight and no consumer protection in the US. If I had that quality of service in Europe that I have in Boston then I'm sure they would fine the hell out of the carriers and you would be entitled to suspend payments.

You mean text messages don't cost 3¢ per message?! How could they be cheating us?!

...

Yeah, would be nice if the regulators actually regulated instead of just getting in bed with the industry.

 

[hushmartin]

Wait.

Isn't that iPhones and other smartphones don't get 3G because of some band frequency on T-Mobile's network?

What's up with that?

That's about right. Att's 3g and T-mo's 3g are on different bands, but they share edge data band, so anyone willing to go edge only and JB can use an iphone on T-mo.

I'm betting that Att will start broadcasting their signal on t-mo's towers to improve Att signal. Then they will either phase out t-mo's bands or use all of them... whichever gets the most bang for their buck. I'd put my money on phasing out the t-mo bands. It seems like it would require less change over all--change is expensive.