Comments

1
It's also "By the way, since we're such a wonderful corporate family, while we can't guarantee what's going to happen to you in the future, we know that you certainly wouldn't consider giving up any juicy trade secrets that could potentially compromise us, right? Because we're family, remember? Love, Dad"
2
There should be a cell phone co-op.

It works for money management, groceries, and athletic equipment; why not cell phones?
3
@2, because building a cell phone network costs billions. It's not like slicing up big blocks of Cheddar at the Wednesday night co-op meeting.

What are the "significant consumer benefits" that would have accompanied this merger? Getting to forego the aggro of comparison shopping for plans? I think we should be told.
4
The CEO is full of it and is just thinking of the money he's going to get out of it while his current employees collect smaller severence checks.
5
You know what would create significant consumer benefits for me? Seeing Philip Humm's head stove in with a five pound hand sledge over and over again in an animated gif.

That, or make your fucking 4G network work at 4G speeds at least occasionally. As it is now, even if I my phone was stuffed up Humm's underpants it would still take two minutes to open up a tiny spreadsheet. Most of the time, even downtown, the cute little icon (hey, thanks for that, they're great looking) says "2G". Having a T-Mobile phone is like living in 1991 again.
6
There are a lot of complicated issues here, but legally, the test of whether something's a monopoly or not is pretty straight-forward. I suspect that the DoJ wouldn't have filed this suit unless the knew they had a damned good chance of prevailing.
7
That's too cynical. Simply substitute "shareholder" for "customer" and you'll be more on the mark.
8
Hey, Fnarf, you think you've got problems? I average 4-500 kb/sec on AT&T's network. Blazing speed, there.
9
Wait, I fucked that up. 4-500 bytes per second.
10
@3: Don't underestimate the size and growth potential of co-ops. REI sees $1.66 billion in revenue per year. The Navy Federal Credit Union has over $40 billion in assets.

Yes, you probably have to start small. So you find a provider who's willing to let you resell service (probably Sprint); buy phones in bulk and sell them for cheap; and when you have the money, start building your own towers.

Why would any company agree to resell service to a future competitor? Well, maybe because regulators were on their ass, and they thought this was the easiest way to make the DOJ happy without helping out a "real" competitor.

Another strategy is taking advantage of divestment. In New England, when Fleet bought BankBoston, they were required to sell off a large portion of their retail branches, so that they wouldn't have a de facto monopoly. More relevantly, when Verizon bought Alltel, they were required to divest over 100 of Alltel's markets. I don't think it's ludicrous to imagine a co-op buying one of those markets -- possibly with some seed money from other local co-ops (of which Seattle has plenty).
11
Has any merger, anywhere, ever actually benefited the consumer? I'm scratching my head on that one. Most of 'em are just another way for the companies to get rid of smaller, independent companies with actual customer service and useful products and force-feed us the same indifferent service and lowest common denominator crap nationwide.
12
But the question nagging me is, where do they plan to shove it?
13
@7

You hit the nail on the head. Rarely is the customer #1 anymore.
14
Well, if Humm needs a career change, he could probably be a pretty good actor. Anyone that can deliver that load of crap with a straight face could deliver any line.

Don't let anyone tell you any different: this is all about AT&T getting market share. They could easily improve their network without T-Mobile.
15
I have heard at&t is mostly after more bandwidth and towers.
16
I know for a fact that there isn't a single T-mo employee below executive level that wants this deal to go through. Not a goddamned one.
17
We've been screwed by airline mergers, bank mergers, etc. I don't like it, but what makes this merger any different?

Please wait...

Comments are closed.

Commenting on this item is available only to members of the site. You can sign in here or create an account here.


Add a comment
Preview

By posting this comment, you are agreeing to our Terms of Use.