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FCC Approves AT&T's Purchase of Cricket with Conditions

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Mar 13, 2014, 3:22 PM   by Eric M. Zeman

The Federal Communications Commission today approved AT&T's proposed purchase of Leap Wireless and its assets, including Cricket Wireless. The acquisition includes 4.6 million customers, as well as spectrum, network equipment, and other assets, all of which will be transferred from Leap to AT&T. However, based on the FCC's analysis of the proposal, AT&T has to agree to a handful of conditions. First, AT&T has to divest some spectrum in select markets in southern Texas. Second, AT&T has to deploy LTE on Leap's unused spectrum within three to 12 months after the deal closes. Third, AT&T has to deploy LTE in six Texas markets within 18 months. Fourth, AT&T has to offer certain low-cost rate plans. Fifth, AT&T has to offer a device trade-in program for both smartphones and feature phones. Further, AT&T has to maintain Cricket's current CDMA-based roaming agreements for as long as it continues to operate the CDMA network. Last, AT&T has to divest ownership that Leap has in a competitive wireless telecommunications provider (if Leap doesn't divest them before the deal closes). As long as AT&T does all these things, the FCC believes the proposal will have minimal impact on the competitive nature of the market and will be a net benefit to customers who will eventually gain access to AT&T's LTE 4G network. Neither AT&T nor Cricket has said exactly when they expect the deal to close.

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dougm

Mar 13, 2014, 3:47 PM

Aio to the landfill

Great, all that stuff and money they poured into the Aio stores and brand can go into the landfill now.
Well, the signs and whole brouhaha over the shade of pink/purple they were using can go to the landfill, but otherwise it'll be the same. They're just gonna slap the Cricket brand over what they built with AIO and merge the two.
Only the Aio name, nothing else. And since Aio didn't seem to be going anywhere, and with the T-Mobile logo lawsuit, big changes were coming anyway.
 
 
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