SUMMARY: Comments explaining why the Justice Department’s proposed consent decree permitting the Sprint/T-Mobile merger to go forward is not adequate to protect competition and consumers. It proposed to allow the elimination of a current wireless carrier with its own nationwide network, Sprint, thus reducing the wireless market from four carriers to three. Sprint would be “replaced” with DISH, which has no wireless network facilities, in hopes that it might someday build a new network that might potentially provide the fourth network being lost in the merger. Replacing a bird in the hand with a pig in a poke. If the merger goes through, consumers can expect higher costs, less choice, and worse service.
This filing is in the Tunney Act proceeding, in which the court must review the proposed antitrust consent decree, and consider all comments, to determine whether it is in the public interest. Filed jointly with Public Knowledge, Open Technology Institute, and Electronic Frontier Foundation.