Merger of Sprint Corporation and T-Mobile US

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from
Merger of Sprint Corporation and T-Mobile USA
)
Merger of Sprint and T-Mobile
T-Mobile & Sprint before the merger.
Logo of Sprint & T-Mobile until August 2020.
InitiatorT-Mobile US
TargetSprint Corporation
TypeMerger
CostUS$26 billion (all shares deal)
InitiatedApril 29, 2018
CompletedApril 1, 2020

Sprint Corporation and T-Mobile US merged in 2020 in an all shares deal for $26 billion. The deal was announced on April 29, 2018.[1][2][3] After a two-year-long approval process the merger was closed on April 1, 2020,[4][5][6] with T-Mobile emerging as the surviving brand. The Sprint brand was discontinued by T-Mobile on August 2, 2020.

Preliminary discussions and announcement

Sprint targeting T-Mobile US

In December 2013, multiple reports indicated that

antitrust concerns and an explicit goal by FCC chairman Tom Wheeler to maintain four national carriers in the United States.[10][11] On April 30, 2014, Bloomberg reported that Sprint was in talks with its lenders to ensure that the company would be financially prepared for the bid, then valued at $24 billion and planned for "summer 2014". It was also reported that due to his success within the company, then T-Mobile CEO John Legere was the top contender to be named CEO of a merged Sprint/T-Mobile and that Sprint had insisted on a low termination fee to prevent regulators from being given an incentive to block the deal, as had occurred with AT&T's failed attempt to purchase T-Mobile.[12]

On August 1, 2014, Xavier Niel's Iliad SA publicly announced a $16 billion all-cash counter-bid to acquire a 56% stake in T-Mobile US and to be funded using equity and debt. Iliad is the parent company of French carrier Free Mobile, which had, like T-Mobile, undertaken disruptive business moves to undercut its competitors, triggering a "price war" among them upon its launch in 2012. Credit Suisse analysts felt that the bid would not be attractive to the company's current shareholders due to its lower value in comparison to Sprint's bid, but could "put pressure on Sprint to move sooner rather [than] later."[13][14]

On August 4, 2014, Bloomberg reported that Sprint had abandoned its bid to acquire T-Mobile, considering the unlikelihood that such a deal would be approved by the U.S. government and its regulators.[15]

T-Mobile targeting Sprint

On February 17, 2017, Reuters reported that Softbank was considering selling its majority stake in Sprint to

Trump administration.[16] However, after months of speculation and rumors about a potential deal being reached, both T-Mobile and Sprint announced on November 4, 2017, that while they have had discussions about a possible merger, the two parties had decided to end merger talks due to not being able to agree on the terms of the deal,[17] due to Softbank's board of directors reported vote on October 27 where they decided not to give up control of Sprint.[18]

Announcement

Sprint and T-Mobile once again resumed talks of a merger in April 2018 and announced a merger agreement on April 29.[1][2][3]

Approval process

Reception

Support

On September 21, 2018, Tracfone Wireless voiced its support for the merger. They stated "With the merger of T-Mobile and Sprint, and the resulting more rapid deployment of a nationwide 5G network with broader coverage, greater capacity, higher throughput and lower latency, the wholesale market place will be more competitive with three full service competitors, rather than two. The increase in competition should have the greatest effect in rural areas. The resulting excess capacity would be available for MVNOs in these areas as a third option that has not been available in the current marketplace.”[19]

On June 28, 2019, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai voiced his support for the merger. He discussed 5G and how the FCC is working to accelerate its deployment in the U.S. One of the pillars of T-Mobile and Sprint's merger is how they plan to use their combined spectrum to deploy a nationwide 5G network, and he said during his remarks that “one of the most critical steps that the FCC can take is to approve the T-Mobile/Sprint transaction." He went on to say that Sprint has much mid-band spectrum, but that “the company standing alone does not have the capacity to deploy 5G in this spectrum throughout large parts of rural America.” The combined T-Mobile-Sprint will have the capacity to do that, he claimed, pointing to a T-Mobile and Sprint commitment to deploy mid-band 5G to 88 percent of the U.S. population, including two-thirds of rural consumers. “We should seize the opportunity to provide 5G to rural America and close the digital divide,” he said.[20]

Opposition

On August 28, 2018, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) said that it opposed the merger between T-Mobile and Sprint in the proposed set up. The CWA, a union that represents 700,000 workers, claimed that the merger would result in more than 28,000 jobs being lost, a number that it said it came to by performing an analysis based on location data for all of the retail locations involved in the proposed merger. They stated that the merger which raised competitive and national security concerns, would lead to loss of jobs, and that both companies would be liable to build out nationwide 5G on their own.[21]

Dish Network initially opposed the merger prior to its deal to buy Boost Mobile and Spectrum when the deal was closed. They voiced their opposition multiple times, stating that data from other countries that experienced four-to-three times reductions in the number of carriers to saying that the T-Mobile-Sprint merger could lead to an increase in prices, not a decrease like T-Mobile has claimed.[22]

On December 13, 2018, an opposition group was formed called "4Competition Coalition" which was used to voice a combined voice of opposition between many companies and organizations. In addition to the CWA and Dish Network, these included the AFL-CIO, Common Cause, C Spire, Fight for the Future, New America's Open Technology Institute, NTCA - The Rural Broadband Association, Open Markets Institute, Public Knowledge, Rural Wireless Association, the Greenlining Institute, and Writers Guild of America West.[23]

Regulatory approval

On June 18, 2018, Sprint and T-Mobile filed documents with the FCC, which opened the transaction for public commentary and set the stage for the agency to either issue a red light or a green light on the merger. FCC docket 18-197 would be the official home for documents relating to the proposed merger. FCC granted their request to withhold "competitively sensitive information" from the proceeding, which was filed in a separate filing.[24][25][26]

On April 29, 2019, completion of the merger was extended from April 29, 2019, to July 29, due to the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division's chief saying that he had not decided whether to approve the merger or not.[27]

On July 26, 2019, the

AGs (or loss of lawsuit); the Spectrum sale would be completed 3 years after the closure of the merger to allow time for Sprint legacy network customers to switch to the new T-Mobile network.[28][29][30][31]

On October 18, 2019, the merger received formal approval by the FCC in a 3–2 vote.

On November 5, 2019, the FCC officially approved the merger on specific conditions. These conditions include 5G being deployed to 97% of Americans within 3 years of the merger closing, and 90% of Americans having access to speeds of 100Mbit/s or greater. The merger was not yet closed, as they still needed to win or bypass the lawsuit from the state AGs and get approval from the California PUC. John Legere (T-Mobile's CEO) expected the merger to be completed in early 2020.[32][33][34]

On April 1, 2020, Judge Timothy Kelly completed his Tunney Act review of the merger and DOJ settlement, finding no antitrust concerns and approving the merger. This was the final federal regulatory proceeding they needed completed before closing.[4][35]

Lawsuit from State AGs