FCC Approves T-Mobile-Sprint Merger

Published on 10-16-2019 01:35 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - T-Mobile US Inc’s (TMUS.O) proposed $26.5 billion tie-up with Sprint Corp (S.N) won formal approval from the Federal Communications Commission on Wednesday in a vote split along party lines, two sources told Reuters.

Chairman Ajit Pai and two Republican commissioners voted to approve the deal while two Democratic commissioners voted against it, the sources said.

The text of the approval order is not expected to be released until later in the month.

The deal to combine the third and fourth largest U.S. wireless carriers, which has been fighting for government approval since April 2018, still faces a lawsuit brought by a group of state attorneys general, headed by New York.

The lawsuit against Sprint and its parent company Softbank Group Corp and T-Mobile and its parent Deutsche Telekom AG argues the deal will lead to higher prices for consumers. A trial date has been set for Dec. 9.

The U.S. Justice Department approved the deal in July.

Under the Justice Department deal, the companies would divest Sprint’s prepaid businesses, including Boost Mobile, to satellite television company Dish Network Corp (DISH.O), and provide it with access to 20,000 cell sites and hundreds of retail locations. That deal is worth about $5 billion.

Source: Reuters

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Andrew Currie has been blogging about mobile phones since 2001, smartphones (depending on how you define them) since 2002 and smartwatches since 2014.
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_{This article was originally published in forum thread:
FCC Approves T-Mobile-Sprint Merger
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116 Comments

L33 - 10-16-2019, 02:09 PM
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Not surprising. Now they just gotta deal with AGs and they're all done. I suspect they'll pick off AGs one by one until December 8th and take the rest of them head on.

freakonomics101 - 10-16-2019, 02:32 PM
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Wow. I can’t think of anything else to say lol

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

offthegrid - 10-16-2019, 02:34 PM
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Originally Posted by L33

Not surprising. Now they just gotta deal with AGs and they're all done. I suspect they'll pick off AGs one by one until December 8th and take the rest of them head on.

They'll cut deals with all of them. They're really only looking for a bribe.

obeythelaw - 10-16-2019, 02:53 PM
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Exactly, T-Mobile wants the lawsuits taken care of. It's nothing but the State AGs trying to get something out of this. I expect that they will all be resolved by the end of the year. Hopefully, that will let the new T-Mobile start using Sprint spectrum to fill in gaps that Band 71 does not cover yet.

cricket101 - 10-16-2019, 05:13 PM
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i was doing some reading and just saw that Dish will get sprints entire 800mhz network?!?!? thought they was just taking the prepaid and customers??

offthegrid - 10-16-2019, 05:41 PM
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Originally Posted by cricket101

i was doing some reading and just saw that Dish will get sprints entire 800mhz network?!?!? thought they was just taking the prepaid and customers??

The spectrum yes. I don't know how they'll deal with antennas and attached equipment - whether those things can be separated for sale or not.

@TheRealDanny - 10-16-2019, 10:29 PM
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Does T-Mobile have to (by law) pause the combination with Sprint until the matters with each state is resolved or are they choosing to do so?

Qt0 - 10-16-2019, 10:56 PM
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Originally Posted by cricket101

i was doing some reading and just saw that Dish will get sprints entire 800mhz network?!?!? thought they was just taking the prepaid and customers??

I think so, but Sprint doesn't have that much 800mhz to begin with, so its not a huge loss.

mogelijk - 10-17-2019, 02:08 AM
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Originally Posted by offthegrid

The spectrum yes. I don't know how they'll deal with antennas and attached equipment - whether those things can be separated for sale or not.

From what I have read, I seem to recall that T-Mobile gets all the towers and equipment. I wouldn't be surprised if there is something in the deal that gives Dish the first right to buy any towers that T-Mobile does not want, if Dish wants them.

L33 - 10-17-2019, 07:34 AM
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Originally Posted by @TheRealDanny

Does T-Mobile have to (by law) pause the combination with Sprint until the matters with each state is resolved or are they choosing to do so?

Yes and no, its somewhat of a gray area. However they're going down the route of pausing all merger operations until the lawsuits are settled.

DRNewcomb - 10-17-2019, 07:45 AM
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Originally Posted by offthegrid

The spectrum yes. I don't know how they'll deal with antennas and attached equipment - whether those things can be separated for sale or not.

Dish will be able to take over any of Sprint's tower leases that T-Mobile does not need. I'd imagine that Sprint's equipment at those towers would be depreciated to the point that it would cost T-Mobile more to remove it than to just turn it over to Dish.

Guest597 - 10-17-2019, 02:36 PM
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So I guess its almost a done deal now?

DRNewcomb - 10-17-2019, 05:07 PM
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Originally Posted by themanhimself

So I guess its almost a done deal now?

There are still suits filed by state AGs.

offthegrid - 10-17-2019, 05:36 PM
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Originally Posted by DRNewcomb

Dish will be able to take over any of Sprint's tower leases that T-Mobile does not need. I'd imagine that Sprint's equipment at those towers would be depreciated to the point that it would cost T-Mobile more to remove it than to just turn it over to Dish.

I think Tmobile would likely lease that spectrum back from Dish for the foreseeable future though because separating it via new connections down the tower, new equipment huts and new back haul to switching gear that isn't in place at all isn't going to pop up over night.

hwertz - 10-17-2019, 08:43 PM
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Yep, I doubt Dish will want Sprint's 800mhz equipment; Dish plans a 5G network, while Sprint's equipment is probably not 5G upgradeable in any way. Sprint's got 800mhz as their sole low band spectrum, so I would guess the antennas are tuned particularly for that range. Dish has 600, 700, and 800 low so they'd probably want different antennas as well.

It'd make sense to lease the spectrum to T-Mo to continue operating 800mhz LTE until Dish actually gets around to doing something with it in a given area.

If you have Sprint, don't fear! Might need a new phone to replace that 800mhz coverage, but not for several years; at that point, rather than 800mhz you'd be using t-mo's 600mhz and 700mhz spectrum for max range, and of course you'd have roughly twice as much pcs (1900) and AWS (2100) (both Sprint's and T-Mos) for when you're closer but not quite in 2500mhz range.

shilohcane - 10-17-2019, 11:08 PM
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Originally Posted by offthegrid

I think Tmobile would likely lease that spectrum back from Dish for the foreseeable future though because separating it via new connections down the tower, new equipment huts and new back haul to switching gear that isn't in place at all isn't going to pop up over night.

I think that it will be at least a year plus before Dish even buys the 800 MHz since they have no network and will be leasing all of Dish’s 600 MHz spectrums. They could be leasing all of Dish’s cell phone spectrum to T- Mobile for a while since the Boost phones don’t even work on some of Dish’s current spectrum bands. Boost customers don’t have a lot of quality phones.

offthegrid - 10-18-2019, 10:31 AM
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Originally Posted by shilohcane

I think that it will be at least a year plus before Dish even buys the 800 MHz.

Isn't Tmobile selling that spectrum part of the approved deal? How would they say, 'oh don't worry, we'll buy it next year - we promise.' I'm not sure that would fly 'if' in fact that is part of the requirement that gained both FCC and DOJ approval.

shilohcane - 10-18-2019, 10:52 AM
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Originally Posted by offthegrid

Isn't Tmobile selling that spectrum part of the approved deal? How would they say, 'oh don't worry, we'll buy it next year - we promise.' I'm not sure that would fly 'if' in fact that is part of the requirement that gained both FCC and DOJ approval.

Dish and T-Mobile will either sign an agreement to buy the 800Mhz in the future or buy it and lease it to T-Mobile. Dish doesn’t have any revenue to pay for thousands of tower leases. Dish is going to lease all of their 600 MHz spectrum to T-Mobile for a few years since Boost customers don’t have Band 71 phones. The new T-Mobile is going to have to transfer all the non-Boost Sprint customers to the new T-Mobile. Dish has no use for 800MHz or the revenue to build out yet. I expect Dish to also lease their other spectrum to T-Mobile to increase their revenue plus meet the FCC deadline in 2020 for that spectrum under the use it or lose it FCC rule. Dish is going to start out as a NVMO at first. Dish’s plan for a Dish Native Network that will be 5G under the Release 16 which is stand alone version of 5G.

offthegrid - 10-21-2019, 11:55 AM
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Originally Posted by shilohcane

Dish and T-Mobile will either sign an agreement to buy the 800Mhz in the future or buy it and lease it to T-Mobile.

Which is exactly what I originally stated and now you cite that as a possible yourself. Talk about circular logic.

mogelijk - 10-21-2019, 06:00 PM
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Colorado is dropping their lawsuit against the T-Mobile/Sprint merger. Colorado is evidence that the states are not really objecting to the merger, more that the lawsuits are trying to get things from the merger. In Colorado's case, they are dropping it after Dish has promised to build their new wireless headquarters in the state.

I suspect we'll see more lawsuits dropped by states over the coming days.