OTI: Sprint/T-Mobile Conditions Won’t Work
Regulators Urged to Block the Merger
Press Release
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May 20, 2019
Today, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai announced his support for T-Mobile’s proposed merger with Sprint. New America’s Open Technology Institute (OTI) strongly opposes the transaction because it will increase prices, kill jobs, devastate the prepaid and wholesale markets, and threaten the Lifeline program. OTI has urged the FCC to block the deal in a petition to deny, reply comments, and meetings with regulators. Crucially, the Department of Justice and many state attorneys general are still reviewing the transaction.
The following quote can be attributed to Joshua Stager, senior counsel at New America’s Open Technology Institute:
“We strongly disagree with Chairman Pai. This merger would be a disaster for the American people. Shrinking the wireless market to just three major providers would worsen the digital divide and leave consumers paying more for less. The conditions that T-Mobile belatedly put forth today do nothing to alleviate these concerns. No one who has paid any attention to merger enforcement over the past decade can seriously believe this will work. Chairman Pai has criticized conditions like these in the past, so the sudden collapse of his convictions is disappointing. We urge the Justice Department and state attorneys general to block this deal.”
The following quote can be attributed to Michael Calabrese, director of the Wireless Future Project at OTI:
“The commitments announced by T-Mobile, Sprint, and Chairman Pai do not add up to real 5G services for rural and small town America. Six long years from now, only two-thirds of the rural population would have service that is even one-tenth as robust as the real 5G that other carriers are already deploying in more profitable urban areas. The reality is that the merged company is no more likely to extend the ultra-fast 5G service that carriers are touting into rural and even exurban areas for many years, a fact that T-Mobile itself acknowledged just recently.”