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Facebook IPO : Is mobile a significant risk factor?

February 3, 2012

Analysis of:FaceBook, Inc. Registration Statement, Form S-1 | www.sec.gov

In its S-1 Facebook identifies use on mobile devices as a risk factor for future business. More broadly, Facebook’s future performance hinges on the evolution of the broadband access market and whether this market becomes an operator-controlled “walled garden” or duopolistic “walled gardens”. That outcome is likely in the U.S. if the Verizon/Cable MSO transactions are approved and AT&T follows suit.

What do the Verizon/cable MSO transactions mean for Sprint-Nextel?

February 1, 2012

I believe Verizon’s initiatives with four major cable MSOs  (multiple system operators) - three of whom have been partners with Sprint and Clearwire – are the result of yet another example of  Sprint management’s ineffable ability to set the wrong priorities for itself, and make harmful strategic and tactical moves that waste the potential of its assets, from spectrum to partners.  Verizon’s spectrum transactions and accompanying commercial arrangements with cable MSOs place Sprint’s path to establishing a competitive mobile broadband network (its Network Vision) in peril, while strengthening Verizon’s already formidable position against Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile.

Does LightSquared win the prize for the most inept regulatory and lobbying campaign of 2011?

December 29, 2011

Analysis of:PETITION FOR A DECLARATORY RULING, submitted to the FCC on December 20, 2011 | www.lightsquared.com

I believe LightSquared’s latest attempt to obtain a declaratory ruling from the FCC that GPS receivers are not entitled to any protection from the company’s planned operations in the adjacent 1.6 GHz band is inept and unlikely to be successful.

Where is AT&T's board when adult supervision is needed?

December 14, 2011

Despite numerous setbacks in its attempt to acquire T-Mobile USA, AT&T is continuing to push forward with the same arguments for the deal. Its executives keep repeating the same assertions that I believe opponents have refuted. The allegations AT&T is leveling at the FCC are unlikely to be productive.

Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile USA: Between a Rock and a Hard Place?

December 9, 2011

Analysis of:AT&T Bombs in Customer Satisfaction Survey | www.channelpartnersonline.com

Deutsche Telekom (DT) faces a dilemma in its transaction with AT&T. The longer the possibility of DT subsidiary T-Mobile USA being acquired by AT&T remains alive, the more DT’s position in the market will deteriorate. At the same time, its freedom to maneuver will be frozen. Yet an initiative by DT to terminate the agreement might imperil AT&T’s payment of the handsome break- up fee DT negotiated. This payment would allow T-Mobile to emerge in a relatively strong position after this transaction is blocked, an increasingly likely outcome.

Is Sprint's business at risk from competition or its own mistakes?

December 7, 2011

Analysis of:Verizon to buy SpectrumCo's AWS spectrum for $3.6B | www.fiercewireless.com

Verizon Wireless’s acquisition of SpectrumCo’s valuable AWS spectrum is another example of Sprint management’s seemingly endless ability to miss opportunities and get its priorities wrong. AT&T and Verizon can legitimately claim that Sprint’s troubles are largely of its own making and not the result of anticompetitive actions by the two companies.

What Should AT&T Do Now?

December 1, 2011

Analysis of:"AT&T Is Not Ma Bell Anymore--Or Is It?", October 14th., 2011 ; "T-Mobile USA: A Better Future Without AT&T", October 6th, 2011 "No Merger, No Conditions, No Way: Rejecting AT&T, T-Mobile Deal Is Onl | www.bna.com

A wave of speculation has arisen about what AT&T and others might or should do now that the approval of AT&T’s acquisition of T-Mobile USA appears unlikely. Most of these ideas are nonsensical from the strategic, competitive, and operational perspectives of the businesses involved. Furthermore, they are oblivious to the needs, expectations and likely responses of customers. It is high time to relegate the lawyers, economists for hire, financial analysts and Beltway insiders to the back seat and leave the driving to entrepreneurial business executives, network and technology planners and customer service and marketing professionals. 

How should spectrum efficiency be balanced against overall economic efficiency?

November 30, 2011

Assigning all bandwidth for mobile services to a single operator would, in theory, allow the efficiency of spectrum use to be maximized. However, maximization of innovation and overall economic efficiency requires competition between several operators. Sensible and effective regulation is required to achieve a productive balance between these two worthy goals.

Spectrum Allocation in India: More Dysfunctional than Corrupt?

November 16, 2011

Analysis of:"2G Spectrum Scam" | timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Ironically, official spectrum allocation policy in India may be more harmful to India’s telecommunication operators and Government revenue than alleged corrupt practices in spectrum allocation.

What is the connection between AT&T and the Greek financial crisis?

November 15, 2011

Analysis of:T-Mobile USA: A Better Future Without AT&T | prodnet.www.neca.org

AT&T has consistently asserted that its proposed acquisition of T-Mobile USA is the only way to rescue that company from inevitable decline, since T-Mobile USA parent Deutsche Telekom (DT) has decided to focus on more promising opportunities in Europe. However, I believe DT’s true motivation in accepting AT&T’s “offer you can’t refuse” is driven not by an allegedly unavoidable decline for T-Mobile USA, but rather by DT’s urgent need to dig out from its disastrous investment in Greece.

Unilateralism and Exceptionalism Have No Place in Wireless Policy

October 7, 2011

Analysis of:EC Official Adds Galileo, EGNOS Worries to FCC's LightSquared-GPS Deliberation | www.insidegnss.com

Both LightSquared’s LTE terrestrial network proposal and the AT&T/T-Mobile merger have significant international implications.  However, these implications have been largely ignored by their protagonists, and the FCC, as well as in most analyses of their pros and cons. Yet, wireless propagation is not confined within national boundaries. This neglect is disturbing and technically dangerous, and also erodes respect for the U.S. as a model to be emulated in telecommunications policy.

Sprint continues to play into the hands of AT&T

September 26, 2011

Analysis of:Sprint's Hesse: DOJ lawsuit against AT&T/T-Mobile won't prevent consolidation | www.dailyfinance.com

From my vantage point, Sprint Nextel has been consistently inept in its legal and lobbying efforts opposing the proposed AT&T and T-Mobile USA merger. This is disturbing given Sprint’s very high stakes in the outcome. Other deal opponents have produced more compelling evidence and arguments that are exposing the harm that this merger would cause.

T-Mobile USA has better AT&T alternatives than Sprint

September 20, 2011

Analysis of:T-Mobile lawsuit's court date just the beginning of AT&T-Justice feud | thehill.com

Deutsche Telekom’s claim that T-Mobile USA has no future outside the embrace of AT&T is motivated by its eagerness to accept the offer and has no basis in fact. At the same time, the idea that the only or best alternative for T-Mobile USA is a merger with Sprint is unimaginative and ignores the technological, operational and management nightmare that this combination would create.

AT&T has run out of arguments to justify its acquisition of T-Mobile

September 12, 2011

Analysis of:AT&T to DOJ: Get a Grip | www.nationaljournal.com

AT&T’s response to the Department of Justice’s (DoJ) suit to block the proposed merger with T-Mobile USA contains no new evidence or arguments to add to what AT&T has already expressed publicly and in its FCC filings. It gives the DoJ no incentive to compromise.

Local spectrum divestments cannot justify the AT&T/T-Mobile merger

September 8, 2011

Analysis of:Department of Justice may Require AT&T Spectrum Divestment | www.strategyanalytics.com

Divestments of some spectrum in selected areas as conditions for consent to the AT&T/T-Mobile merger will do nothing to alter the substantial harmful consequences of this transaction. They would make sense only if you believe AT&T’s argument, which flies in the face of customer and provider behavior (including its own) that wireless markets are local and therefore any antitrust issues arising from this merger are only local in nature and can be resolved locally.

Is it realistic to approve the AT&T/T-Mobile merger with strict regulatory conditions?

September 7, 2011

Analysis of:AT&T could divest up to 25% of T-Mobile to win approval for deal | www.fiercewireless.com

I believe it’s a pipe dream that there are enforceable conditions that could justify approving the AT&T/T-Mobile merger. In any form, I believe the deal would have profoundly harmful consequences for customers, competition, innovation and the U.S. economy.

The DOJ's Lawsuit Against AT&T: The Beginning Of The End?

August 31, 2011

Analysis of:U.S. Moves to Block AT&T Merger with T-Mobile | dealbook.nytimes.com

The US Department of Justice’s lawsuit to block the merger of AT&T with T-Mobile does not automatically kill the deal. It sends a clear signal, however, that the arguments about the harm this merger will cause are having an effect, while the cracks in AT&T’s unsupported assertions are becoming increasingly apparent.

Does AT&T believe that acquiring T-Mobile would only affect wireless and local markets?

August 30, 2011

If AT&T’s takeover of T-Mobile USA goes through, I believe it would affect the entire sector of network services. AT&T, however, is arguing for the transaction to be approved with it making at most only fundamentally irrelevant divestitures of spectrum in selected local license areas.

AT&T, Packet Switching, And Stifling Innovation

August 19, 2011

Analysis of:view (application/pdf Object) | fjallfoss.fcc.gov

AT&T's rejection of packet switching is typical of this company's attitude over many decades towards innovations that come from the world outside its walls or pose challenges to its existing sources of revenue. It illustrates in stark fashion why it would be very dangerous to allow AT&T to acquire T-Mobile USA to gain more power as a gatekeeper able to decide unilaterally which, how effectively and when network-dependent innovations will or will not be made available to customers.

AT&T Milking Everything It Can

August 18, 2011

Analysis of:view (application/pdf Object) | fjallfoss.fcc.gov

This letter to the FCC is a remarkable illustration of AT&T's ability to win support from organizations that do not have a clue about what it is up to. Nor do they grasp what AT&T has singularly failed to do that is already in its power to improve their access to wireless services.

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