AT&T Buying T-Mobile, What It Means For The Rest Of Us

Fending off a potentially suicidal buyout from Sprint, the German parent of T-Mobile USA has sold off all their American holdings to AT&T for 39 billion dollars.  After the joining together T-Mobile's 35 million subscribers to AT&T 95 million subscribers the combined company will have 125 million subscribers putting they way ahead of Verizon's 96 million subscribers.  Obtaining control of T-Mobile's infrastructure, AT&T could potentially ease some of the congestion on their wireless network in America's five largest cities.

Of course current T-Mobile subscribers will get the iPhone when the acquisition completes and become AT&T subscribers.  Current AT&T subscribers will get access to AWS network and in preparation current AT&T hardware will needed to by upgraded to support AWS.  That will give subscribers on Wind Mobile and Mobilicity a greater range hardware including the iPhone if Apple chooses support AWS.  Wind Mobile and Mobilicity subscribers will get better US roaming when AT&T upgrades their own towers to add AWS capability.

It's possible that subscribers on T-Mobile's subscribers on low priced plans will have to upgrade to a more expensive plan on AT&T, since it will be several more months before the acquisition gets approval by the FCC and FTC it maybe a good idea to sign on to a contract renewal before the approvals come.