Monopolies making a comeback :o
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Rachel Bilson
Joined: Oct 2005
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From: South Bend/Walkerton, Ind
aka Heywoodjablowme
Joined: Jul 2003
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From: Nashville, TN
working for bellsouth, all i've heard lately is people talking about how it is going back to before the vesitutre when at&t was broken up into all the "baby-bells".
what most people don't realize is that the att&t of the old days doesn't exist anymore......it went bankrupt years ago & one of the baby-bells(atlantic bell if memory serves me correctly) was smart enough to realize the market value of the name & bought it. so in essesence, what you have are 2 baby-bells merging....far from the market monopoly that the original at&t had back in the days
funny thing about all this is that a year or so ago, cingular bought at&t wireless from at&t.....cingular is owned by bellsouth & bellsouth is being bought out by at&t, so they just shuffled $$$$ around in the long run LOL
what most people don't realize is that the att&t of the old days doesn't exist anymore......it went bankrupt years ago & one of the baby-bells(atlantic bell if memory serves me correctly) was smart enough to realize the market value of the name & bought it. so in essesence, what you have are 2 baby-bells merging....far from the market monopoly that the original at&t had back in the days
funny thing about all this is that a year or so ago, cingular bought at&t wireless from at&t.....cingular is owned by bellsouth & bellsouth is being bought out by at&t, so they just shuffled $$$$ around in the long run LOL
Wannabe yuppie
Joined: Dec 2000
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From: Madison, WI
Well hey, telecom consulting is my business, so let's clear this all up, and no cliff's notes.
The original AT&T was broken up into several companies called Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs), plus AT&T remained as a long-distance carrier.
The RBOCs set about buying each other, merging with each other, etc, until there were only a few left: SBC, Qwest, Verizon & BellSouth.
In 1994, AT&T the long-distance company bought McCaw Cellular and changed the name to AT&T Wireless, creating one of the first nationwide cellular networks.
The RBOCs mostly came out with their own cellular networks that were more regional. After a bunch of consolidation, they all were combined into Verizon Wireless (a joint venture between Verizon and Vodafone) and Cingular (a joint venture between SBC and BellSouth).
AT&T the long distance company spins off AT&T Wireless into its own separate company that has no functional corporate ties to AT&T itself. AT&T Wireless then gets bought up by Cingular.
SBC buys up AT&T the long distance company and decides to adopt the AT&T name as its own, thus making AT&T once again a long-distance and local phoe company, at least for the majority of the country. This company is "the new AT&T" that you've probably seen commercials for.
AT&T now is trying to buy BellSouth (this is not hugely new news by the way...) which will put back together all the RBOCs except for those that became Qwest and Verizon, AT&T long distance, and Cingular (which already absorbed the AT&T Wireless into itself), all under one corporate umbrella.
Now, here's why it's not going to make anything functionally more expensive for anyone.
In the areas where AT&T is the local phone company, there are other options for phone service from Competitive Local Exchange Carriers (CLECs) and also cable companies and other VoIP providers. With the merger, the BellSouth areas become AT&T, and all the CLECs and cable companies and VoIP companies are all still available. Long distance is all the same.
Cingular is already consolidated on the wireless side, but by combining the two stakeholders in the joint venture costs go down, which means more money can be spent on network improvements. And oh yeah, they are spending a TON of money on network improvements. The same other wireless carriers are all around.
There are two points of contention that AT&T needed to address before the FCC approved the merger, and they have addressed those. The first was prices for dedicated trunk lines. In areas where AT&T or BellSouth is the local telco, the other cell carriers need to lease T1 circuits from the telco, and AT&T has agreed to fix the prices on those trunk lines.
The other sticking point is that AT&T and BellSouth own a lot of 2.3 and 2.5 GHz wireless spectrum which is the band that new mobile WiMAX networks are going to be deployed in. Clearwire (a WiMAX broadband ISP coming soon to a major metro area near you) is rapidly expanding, and to please the FCC AT&T has agreed to divest all of its WiMAX spectrum within one year of the merger.
The original AT&T was broken up into several companies called Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs), plus AT&T remained as a long-distance carrier.
The RBOCs set about buying each other, merging with each other, etc, until there were only a few left: SBC, Qwest, Verizon & BellSouth.
In 1994, AT&T the long-distance company bought McCaw Cellular and changed the name to AT&T Wireless, creating one of the first nationwide cellular networks.
The RBOCs mostly came out with their own cellular networks that were more regional. After a bunch of consolidation, they all were combined into Verizon Wireless (a joint venture between Verizon and Vodafone) and Cingular (a joint venture between SBC and BellSouth).
AT&T the long distance company spins off AT&T Wireless into its own separate company that has no functional corporate ties to AT&T itself. AT&T Wireless then gets bought up by Cingular.
SBC buys up AT&T the long distance company and decides to adopt the AT&T name as its own, thus making AT&T once again a long-distance and local phoe company, at least for the majority of the country. This company is "the new AT&T" that you've probably seen commercials for.
AT&T now is trying to buy BellSouth (this is not hugely new news by the way...) which will put back together all the RBOCs except for those that became Qwest and Verizon, AT&T long distance, and Cingular (which already absorbed the AT&T Wireless into itself), all under one corporate umbrella.
Now, here's why it's not going to make anything functionally more expensive for anyone.
In the areas where AT&T is the local phone company, there are other options for phone service from Competitive Local Exchange Carriers (CLECs) and also cable companies and other VoIP providers. With the merger, the BellSouth areas become AT&T, and all the CLECs and cable companies and VoIP companies are all still available. Long distance is all the same.
Cingular is already consolidated on the wireless side, but by combining the two stakeholders in the joint venture costs go down, which means more money can be spent on network improvements. And oh yeah, they are spending a TON of money on network improvements. The same other wireless carriers are all around.
There are two points of contention that AT&T needed to address before the FCC approved the merger, and they have addressed those. The first was prices for dedicated trunk lines. In areas where AT&T or BellSouth is the local telco, the other cell carriers need to lease T1 circuits from the telco, and AT&T has agreed to fix the prices on those trunk lines.
The other sticking point is that AT&T and BellSouth own a lot of 2.3 and 2.5 GHz wireless spectrum which is the band that new mobile WiMAX networks are going to be deployed in. Clearwire (a WiMAX broadband ISP coming soon to a major metro area near you) is rapidly expanding, and to please the FCC AT&T has agreed to divest all of its WiMAX spectrum within one year of the merger.
aka Heywoodjablowme
Joined: Jul 2003
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From: Nashville, TN
^^^ yeah, that's the long version of what i was trying to say....the at&t of today is not the at&t of years ago
the fcc would have never allowed the merger to be approved if it would be reorganizing a monopoly. there were YEARS that bellsouth wasn't allowed to be in the business of selling long distance because they were consider the only local provider in the area they served, so until there was parity in the available local providers.... ie CLECs, then they weren't allowed in that market. about 2 years ago, they finally met all the government criteria & were allowed back in the market....hence the reason their market value has increased & in the end, the reason they are a valuable asset being sought after by at&t
i really don't give 2 fucks.....i just know it'll affect me, my pay & my benefits in a positive way
the fcc would have never allowed the merger to be approved if it would be reorganizing a monopoly. there were YEARS that bellsouth wasn't allowed to be in the business of selling long distance because they were consider the only local provider in the area they served, so until there was parity in the available local providers.... ie CLECs, then they weren't allowed in that market. about 2 years ago, they finally met all the government criteria & were allowed back in the market....hence the reason their market value has increased & in the end, the reason they are a valuable asset being sought after by at&t
i really don't give 2 fucks.....i just know it'll affect me, my pay & my benefits in a positive way
aka Heywoodjablowme
Joined: Jul 2003
Posts: 4,562
Likes: 0
From: Nashville, TN
Cingular is already consolidated on the wireless side, but by combining the two stakeholders in the joint venture costs go down, which means more money can be spent on network improvements. And oh yeah, they are spending a TON of money on network improvements. The same other wireless carriers are all around.
also, this time last year, they had started training us on voip, video on demand & other similar services they were going to be deploying in the next 24-36 months. once the merger talks started, those things all but stopped. from what i hear, at&t uses completly different network equipment, so there was no point in deploying hundreds of millions of dollars of equipment that probably wouldn't be compatible w/ whatever at&t was investing their resources in....again, just smart business.
the next 6 months will be "interesting" for me, but i think it'll be a good thing
