AT&T CEO Sings the Same Old Song: All We Need Is T-Mo

The most pressing need for broadband providers in the US is more spectrum to enable the mobile ecosystem, said AT&T’s CEO and chairman speaking at an event in Grapevine, Texas.

At the TIA 2011 conference AT&T’s Randall Stephenson replayed his talking points on why AT&T needs to buy T-Mobile for $39 billion. At least he’s consistent. He did provide an excellent overview of the current scenario we find ourselves in the mobile industry, noting that if you mobilize a service, usage jumps. Back at the dawn of the mobile phone revolution, voice was mobilized and usage jumped (it’s still rising today according to Stephenson). In the 90's email was mobilized and usage jumped. And in 2007 with the dawn of the iPhone, Internet access was mobilized and data usage jumped dramatically by 8,000 percent for AT&T within three years. However, this is only the beginning in Stephenson’s assessment. AT&T estimates data will grow on its mobile network by 8 to 10 times by 2015. And in addition to the rush of data, the services adopted will be unpredictable, leading Stephenson to predict, “The next five years are not going to be planned and they are not going to be deliberate. In fact they will be somewhat chaotic and will come faster.”