acdc1a said:
Wireless has been competitive in some markets since 2005/2006. Unfortunately the little guys like Metro aren't in every market. Look at their penetration in markets like Detroit and South Florida. If they were a nationwide player things might be different and we could discuss merits of AT&T/T-Mobile mergers. As it stands now there are no merits to such a combination.

If you believe MetroPCS and Cricket constitute competition against any of the big players, you're drinking somebody's kool-aid.

The reality is that another company can only be considered a "competitor" if the products are of roughly the same quality and availability. The fact that MetroPCS and Cricket have such minuscule native networks that they aren't really competitors becaue a very, very large segment of the consumer market will not even consider purchasing cell service that lacks nationwide reach.

The little boys only compete with the big boys for the very, very small segment of local residents who don't care about nationwide reach. Only a small, small portion of AT&T or Verizon's subscriber base would be satisfied with MetroPCS or Cricket coverage area, even if the never dropped calls and had consistent 3G data speeds. They just don't have enough spectrum licenses to compete for lion's share of the customer base.