AT&T expresses interest in FirstNet opportunity, plans to ‘pursue it aggressively’
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AT&T expresses interest in FirstNet opportunity, plans to ‘pursue it aggressively’
But T-Mobile's spectrum strategy clearly is more focused on the incentive auction, based on the statements made by company officials yesterday. The carrier expects to have at least $6 billion that it can bid for the 600 MHz spectrum that will be cleared by TV broadcasters, and that figure could go as high as $10 billion.
“Participating in the upcoming spectrum auction is really going to be a real game-changer for us,” said Braxton Carter, T-Mobile’s executive vice president and CFO. “The low-band spectrum will bring additional [subscriber] retention benefits to us and allow us to continue to expand the network from a geographic standpoint, as well as increase quality in these major urban areas with in-building coverage. ”
T-Mobile historically has had much less spectrum below 1 GHz than Verizon and AT&T. The carrier plans to close that gap by winning spectrum licenses in the incentive auction. T-Mobile officials are particularly enthused that their company will not have to outbid Verizon and AT&T for certain reserve licenses.
“I’m just super excited about this auction,” Ray said. “It’s the first auction in U.S. history where Verizon and AT&T can’t go in and display their foreclosure capabilities that they’ve done on pretty much every damn auction that’s occurred over the last 20 years, so that’s huge. There’s a reserve, and that’s going to allow us to compete more effectively and secure the low-band spectrum that we need.
“It’s a massive, change-the-industry story. Verizon and AT&T have lived in a duopolist world with huge low-band spectrum assets, to the detriment of much competition in the U.S.”
At&t seems to be the best
At&t seems to be the best choice for the firstnet contract in my opinion. Their lte network is broad and very reliable. Seems to be even more reliable than Verizon in most states I’ve travelled in. Also I’ve had way less outages on at&t