US government files to block proposed AT&T / T-Mobile merger

You heard right. Bloomberg is reporting that the United States government (!) just filed court papers in Washington, D.C. to block the much ballyhooed tie-up between AT&T and T-Mobile USA . Oddly enough, T-Mobile and AT&T promised this morning that a total of 5,000 jobs would be hand delivered to the US if the two telcos were allowed to become one, but it’ll take a heck of a lot more convincing now. For what it’s worth, this doesn’t mean that the deal is or isn’t happening — it’s just another step in the process — but it most certainly doesn’t bode well for proponents. Nor for AT&T’s share price. According to the report, the Justice Department feels that the deal would “substantially lessen competition” in the wireless space. In fact, it boldly stated the following: “AT&T’s elimination of T-Mobile as an independent, low-priced rival would remove a significant competitive force from the market.” If things end up falling apart, it’s important to remember that AT&T would be forced to pay Deutsche Telekom $3 billion as a break-up fee , which ought to make Tiger Woods’ misfortunes look like an outright bargain. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in] US government files to block proposed AT&T / T-Mobile merger originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 31 Aug 2011 10:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

Posted by on August 31, 2011. Filed under News, Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.