However, there may still be a way to save the merger. The New York Post reported yesterday that FCC President Pai had "consulted" DOJ antitrust chief, Makan Delrahim, before announcing that he would vote to make sure that he did not have to go ahead. agreement is reached. Many believe this indicates that Pai was able to convince Delrahim to overthrow DOJ staff, which would allow the merger to end. Both agencies have different missions with respect to this agreement; the FCC is concerned about the impact of the merger on the cellular landscape in terms of spectrum, rural coverage and deployment of 5G service; the Department of Justice is concerned about the competitive landscape of the wireless industry if the agreement goes on. While he fears that the number of major US carriers will increase from 4 to 3, a reduction of 25%, others claim that the combined T-Mobile-Sprint would be better able to compete with Verizon and AT & T.
To convince the FCC, T-Mobile and Sprint have agreed to complete 97% of its 5G deployment in three years (85% in rural areas), to keep program prices frozen for three years from the closing of the program. merge and sell them. Prepaid Boost Mobile Unit of Sprint. The report states that Justice Minister Delrahim would like T-Mobile to freeze the prices for seven years instead of the three months agreed with the FCC. After that, about the only other concession that the Justice Department could take out of T-Mobile and Sprint would be that the combined company sells Sprint's Virgin Mobile prepaid unit. T-Mobile already owns MetroPCS. (The Department of Justice could ask John Legere, CEO of T-Mobile, to cut his hair, and we wonder if he would accept this condition to close the deal).
A source states that it will be difficult for the GM to reject the agreement if the FCC approves it.
An anonymous source who works with both T-Mobile and Sprint believes that DOJ approval is a lock. "It will be difficult for Makan (Delrahim) (head of the DOJ) to argue that this will have a negative impact on competition when the FCC will apply these conditions," the source said. "The ministry of justice will erase this unconditionally."
T-Mobile's merger with Sprint still has a chance to be approved
T-Mobile and Sprint originally set April 28 as the closing date for the merger. This was extended until July 29th. If the deal is finalized, T-Mobile could finally join Sprint after years of rumors and bargains. In 2014, both companies had launched trial balloons about a merger, before the FCC and the GM would fire them even before a deal was announced. AT & T thought it had bought T-Mobile, the country's fourth-largest carrier, for $ 39 billion in 2011. That deal would have created the largest wireless service provider in the United States, but was shot down by the Department of Justice. T-Mobile received a nice separation solution from AT & T consisting of $ 3 billion, 128 AWS markets and more. This has helped T-Mobile become what it is now, the fastest growing and most innovative of the four major carriers. The following year, John Legere was appointed CEO and the rest belongs to the story.
T-Mobile is majority-owned by Deutsche Telekom in Germany, while Sprint is 80% owned by SoftBank in Japan. The latter bought 78% of Sprint in 2013 after a fierce battle against Dish Network and its president, Charlie Ergen.
A merger between T-Mobile and Sprint is a successful marriage in the sky of the spectrum. T-Mobile has a ton of 600 MHz low-frequency spectrum, which perfectly matches the Sprint range of 2.5 GHz wave reserves. The merger of the two will help the combined company to create a national 5G network using bands below 6 GHz. Verizon and AT & T plan to use the mmWave spectrum in the range of 24GHz to 100GHz for their 5G mobile service. As high frequencies travel only short distances, the two main wireless carriers in the country will have a longer time to complete their 5G networks from coast to coast.
