"Hopper your way" ™
Hey now I'm listening....
That's the old slogan. Dropped on Monday in lieu of their new slogan "Be your way".
How Should Dish be compensated if Directv/At&T Merge?
- Thread starter nelson61
- Start date
- Latest activity Latest activity:
- Replies 42
- Views 4K
That's the old slogan. Dropped on Monday in lieu of their new slogan "Be your way".
Never was Hopper your way I take full credit for that... It was Have it your way to Be your way....
It was Have it your way to Be your way....
Ugh...I'd hate to see the long lines in the drive thru when Dish SOON gets introduced to McDs."Hopper your way" ™
Hey now I'm listening....
I do not see Dish getting anything out of the deal directly. I do not see it having regulatory hurdles given that U-Verse is pretty small, so it will not be a comcast/twc type deal.
When the FTC requires conditions to allow a merger, the intention is usually to make sure that competition can still occur. They do not want to ensure the survival of any single competitor, only ensure that competition still exists. If during the Delta and Northwest merger, the FTC felt that Delta would gain a monopolistic advantage, they might have required that Delta release some of the gates in the Atlanta airport so that other airlines could compete in Atlanta. They would not have required that Delta hand those gates over to another airline such as AirTran(at the time, later purchased by Southwest).
When the FCC requires conditions to allow a merger, it is usually tied to the possibility of monopolistic use bandwidth. They did place a requirement on Verizon to allow open use of additional LTE bandwidth that they acquired. They were attempting to keep Verizon from operating closed systems(although Verizon found ways around the restrictions and are still just as closed). They might require that a company with a large amount of bandwidth to release some bandwidth in order to purchase another company with a large holding of bandwidth. The reason for that would be to keep one company from owning a monopolistic share of any particular bandwidth usage. They would not pick out one competitor and force the company to give the bandwidth to them.
If either regulating bodies were to provide compensations, it would be to the market, NOT to any single competitor. If the FCC decides that AT&T and DirecTv will have too much satellite bandwidth, then they will require that the bandwidth be turned back in to the FCC. The FCC could then sell the bandwidth. Dish might buy the bandwidth, but some other company could also.
Cell towers are not an issue. In fact AT&T sold off most their towers and leases space on them: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-...-85-billion-tower-deal-with-crown-castle.html
yes. everyone is switching to leasing back space so that they can free up billions in cash. Dish will have an easy time leasing tower space. That $5 billion probably helped fund this DirecTV deal.
That is precisely what this thread is asking. What compensations will Dish benefit in the form of market opportunities, not what will Dish get directly.
This is from the OP:
"How do regulators address that economic fact?
Do they force the merged companies to provide Dish access to more spectrum? An example would be leasing their three (3) 110W transponders to Dish with provision to retain a spot beam for Puerto Rico? Or maybe some of their 119W spectrum?
Do they force the merged companies to offer the ground based portion of triple play to Dish on favorable economic terms?
Do they prohibit packaging that will undercut Dish pricing so as to erode market share (like the predatory short term pricing the airlines use to keep competition out of their Hubs and then proceeding to raise prices above market when the competition folds)?
Whatever it is, they better do something or we will see Dish slowly fade away as they become less competitive. If that happens, it is probably a guarantee that those relying on satellite service will be getting much bigger (inflation adjusted bill) 10 years from now."
Do they force AT&T to give spectrum to Dish?
Do they force AT&T to provide bundled services to Dish at economic discounts?
Do they prohibit AT&T from undercutting Dish's prices?
Those sound like things that Dish would get from AT&T. It sounds like the title of the thread and the text of the OP are asking what will Dish get directly.
Well, in the scope of the "market", Dish is the only other DBS player of competitive significance, so I guess that is why Dish is being mentioned specifically. Any ruling could potentially open up the satellite market for other players (existing or new) to make a splash in the market as well.
The fact that DIRECTV and Dish are satellite operators will not itself be a factor. What is a factor is how the merger will affect consumers in U-Verse areas. By eliminating a competitor, the consumer would have less choice. But, I would argue that since uverse only has 5.7 million TV customers the number of affected consumers will be too small to matter much to regulators.
https://www.att.com/Common/about_us/pdf/uverse_update.pdf
https://www.att.com/Common/about_us/pdf/uverse_update.pdf
If I recall correctly, when there were talks of a Dish and DirecTv merger, Dish was arguing that the real competition was between DBS and cable, not between DBS providers.
But, AT&T says they will use the Directv cash flow to expand their network into the Satellite hinterlands, thus opening up the opportunity to convert the only viable competitor's customers (Dish) to their triple play service in those areas.
True, but this is where ronjohn makes a good point. If giving triple play to rural areas is good for citizens, and DISH isn't providing it, I wouldn't expect that to be considered a non competitive move. Dish in theory could and in fact did with At&t in effect offer triple play.
No difference than satellite customers getting cable internet. One also wonders how many U-Verse customers are already DIRECTV subs. That AT&T Uverse fact page lists 11 million internet subs, but only 5.7 TV subs. I suspect most of the 5.3 million internet only subs have either Dish or DIRECTV, because if they had cable TV they would probably have a cable bundle.
I mentioned earlier that Dish Network could merge with Disneyland/Disney World. That way they can bundle their Hopper with a Disney World "Park ?Hopper Pass."
AT&T and DIRECTV won't share much in the form of fixed costs for the first few years. DIRECTV will lose their CEO and maybe some HR and accounting overhead but the rest of their plant and those who maintain wouldn't appear to be going anywhere.
Once DIRECTV is absorbed (or divested depending on who you ask), things will change more rapidly but DISH will have had some time to continue the roll-out of their forward looking IPTV product.
Whether everybody merges or not, DBS doesn't have a very bright future. DISH may actually be a little more nimble as it has been working on plans for the future and the Chairman of the Board has a majority stake.
