Help me understand

[dsrtao]

ATT is trying to buy T-Mobile because, they say, T-Mobile has this delicious range of frequencies across the US that would enable ATT to end their bandwidth crunch. ATT does not actually promise that they will stop capping data plans if they get to eat T-Mobile.

Clearly, ATT has too many customers and too few resources to supply them. Quality must be going down.

Similarly, T-Mobile must have a lack of customer compared to their resources. So T-Mobile should be growing very quickly, attracting customers from other carriers with T's superior quality (and they can afford to lower prices, too, to attract even more).

The data, though, says (PC Magazine) that ATT is slightly more reliable than T-Mobile, and T-Mobile is slightly faster. And T-Mobile lost 50,000 subscribers overall, and ATT gained 2 million.

Does not compute.

Comments

[seawasp]

Advertising, name, and contracts, m'boy. AT&T has spent more on advertising, their name is old and respected, and they have exclusive or near-exclusive contracts with a number of cellphone providers, most prominently the iPhone, which only allows AT&T and Verizon. T-Mobile not offering iPhone means it's losing right from the get-go.

[zonereyrie.livejournal.com]

T-Mobiles actual geographic coverage is worse, so they can successfully server fewer customers. Their frequency holdings help plug holes in AT&Ts network, but the actual T-Mobile network doesn't cover enough ground. And, no matter what their ads say, T-Mobile has no 4G network. They have a very fast 3G network - HSPA+, but they have no LTE network or plans to build one. *If* you life in an area there they have built out HSPA+ then you may get service faster than AT&T, or even Verizon, but that's a temporary thing. LTE is technically superior and capable of faster speeds. Verizon & AT&T are building out their LTE networks and increasing speeds with upgrades over time. On average Verizon has the fastest network - they have the most 4G (LTE) and 3G (EV-DO) coverage.

So T-Mobile has islands of great performance, larger areas of OK performance, and giant areas of no coverage at all.

T-Mobile is too small to compete well with AT&T and Verizon. Sprint is almost too small really. From a size perspective it'd be better for Sprint & T-Mobile to merge, giving us a real, viable 3rd competitor. But from a technical standpoint it'd be a mess. Sprint is still choking on Nextel, and won't be rid of their iDEN network for a few more years. Now they're going to be adding LTE for 4G, and surely phasing out their existing WiMax 4G network, but in the meantime they'll have both. And Sprint is CDMA/EV-DO, while T-Mobile is GSM/HSPA+. So if they did merge they'd have to decide which network to phase out, and have years of running both.

AT&T is GSM/HSPA+/LTE and T-Mobile is GSM/HSPA+. They use different frequencies, but there is more commonality and pentaband phones might be a solution for them to use both networks. It'd make for an easier transition to absorb T-Mobile's network into AT&T and bring the customers over.

I don't think the merger is a good thing, but T-Mobile has been staggering for a few years and I think they may well not survive at all if the merger is blocked. Unless Sprint decides to suck them up anyway and deal with the issues - I suppose they have enough already, what's a few more?