Wireless Telecommunications

T-Mobile appears to be rallying former regulators and legislators to its side, while some congressional Democrats and some public interest groups are formulating their arguments against the deal. Sitting in the middle are the Federal Communications Commission and Department of Justice, which must sign off on the transaction. It’s unclear how those agencies might act on the deal: Although most observers see the Trump administration as favorable to big businesses, the DoJ filed a lawsuit against AT&T’s attempts to purchase Time Warner.

Windstream is in the process of deploying Radwin’s fixed wireless equipment in two states covering thousands of potential customers, and is considering expanding that effort to additional customers in additional states. 

Rep. Nydia M. Velázquez (D-NY) led 47 Members of Congress in writing to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai urging the commission to preserve the Lifeline program. Lifeline is a federal assistance program under the FCC that provides communications services to low-income consumers. In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, nearly 20 percent of Puerto Rico’s population has relied on Lifeline for essential telecommunications services.

If you're a Sprint customer and have been frustrated by network performance, you may want to cheer on the deal with T-Mobile. If you're a T-Mobile customer, it doesn't represent much of an upgrade. For both groups, this tie-up—which still has to be approved by regulators—carries the risk of higher prices and fewer deals. For simple speed, though, the merger offers a lot of potential upside for Sprint users. Consider the results found by four nationwide tests of the big four carriers—two relying on crowdsourced data, two based on scheduled drive testing.

T-Mobile’s John Legere and Sprint’s Marcelo Claure went to the Federal Communications Commission to begin laying the groundwork for their proposed $26.5 billion merger. They met with FCC Commissioners Michael O'Rielly and Jessica Rosenworcel and laid out much the same case that the companies have presented in public. 

T-Mobile executives for years have downplayed the opportunity for fixed wireless technology to replace wired internet connections. But with the proposed deal to swallow Sprint, T-Mobile executives said that the merger would position the newly-combined company to offer internet services to homes, offices and other locations—a move that would put the company into direct competition with the likes of Comcast, Charter, Verizon and other wired internet service providers.

[Commentary] The proposed merger between Sprint and T-Mobile once again focuses the nation’s attention on next generation 5G wireless service. Burdened with the fact that the current vibrant competition among four wireless companies has benefited consumers greatly (decreasing prices by 13 percent in the last year alone), the companies assert that their merger will accelerate the deployment of 5G. The “China is winning on 5G” argument of Sprint and T-Mobile is creative, and probably  the only rationale they could concoct after the government twice before rejected their proposal to reduce nat

Here’s what three government agencies will weigh as they consider the T-Mobile/Sprint merger.

"[May 1] the bureau initiates a proceeding to further examine the feasibility of opening up 3.7 – 4.2 GHz for commercial use. I have repeatedly called for freeing up this band for commercial purposes and I am pleased to see this important step forward in our process, as it will complement and not delay the Commission’s ongoing work on the matter. I want to thank Congress for their leadership on this spectrum band, particularly Senators Thune and Nelson for raising this issue in the MOBILE NOW Act."