In the business world, mergers and acquisitions play a big role to be on top of the game.
Three years ago, reports about AT&T buying T-Mobile emerged on the World Wide Web which is not something new in the Telecom industry.
AT&T is one of the largest wireless carriers in the U.S, along with Verizon Wireless, while T-Mobile competes to the second largest along with Sprint.
It can be recalled that AT&T announced in a press release on March 20, 2011 that they are to acquire T-Mobile USA from Deutsche Telekom through a cash-and-stock transaction valued at $39 billion; however, as cited by Forbes, Department of Justice and FCC blocked the merger. If the acquisition did push through, AT&T could have been the largest and leading U.S. carrier to date.
This may not be good news to both telecom operator but this event had all U.S. consumers rejoiced.
Since the blockage of the merger, T-Mobile felt the pressure to keep up and compete with AT&T, Verizon and Sprint. As a start, T-Mobile hired John Legere as its new CEO and rebranded the company as "Un-carrier."
According to Quartz, the telecom company offered deals and promos on its services that consumers can truly benefit, in which, includes contract-free plans, early upgrade options, subsidy-free phones, free international data roaming, to name a few.
This move by T-Mobile resulted to an additional 4.4 million subscribers to the company, though; they may have also lost some share in market capitalization.
Quartz cited that the four major carries, AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile, lost $45 billion in market value last month and this may continue if they will not do something about the price war.
With all of these being pointed out, consumers are the ones who really gain from the blocked merger of AT&T and T-Mobile.