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After news broke that Sprint wasn’t going to follow through with the acquisition of T-Mobile, rumors began to fly as to who would step up to the plate next. Many companies names were thrown, out, one of which was Cox Communications Inc. However, Cox president, Pat Esser has made a statement clearing up the rumors.
Cox Communications is privately owned and part of Cox Enterprises. Cox Enterprises currently offers a variety of entertainment and communication services such as digital cable television, telecommunications and wireless services. Based in Sandy Springs, Georgia, Cox enterprises currently has over 2.9 million digital cable subscribers, 3.5 million internet subscribers and 3.2 million digital phone subscribers. While the company may be in a place to acquire other businesses, T-Mobile isn’t one of them.
“We’re not in any discussions to buy T-Mobile,” Esser said during an interview with Reuters. “I don’t see a movement inside of our company that we feel we have to pony up or match up with a wireless company.”
While Esser’s statement dispels all rumors in relation to a possible T-Mobile acquisition, there could be more behind the decision. One of the reasons Sprint decided to stop with their acquisition of T-Mobile was the FCC. The FCC has openly stated that they weren’t in favor of a merger between the two companies due to competition in the US wireless market. However, Cox isn’t exactly one of the top four carriers in the US. How that could affect the decision of the FCC to allow a Cox/T-Mobile merger is unknown.
Another company who has yet to dispel any rumors of a T-Mobile merger is Iliad. Iliad has already requested financial information from T-Mobile in order to better asses the company in preparation for a bid according to early rumors. Those rumors were followed by more that said T-mobile would deny the company access to the information, which is essentially a “not interested” from T-Mobile.
What are your thoughts, is T-Mobile strong enough to compete on their own in the US market, or should a company acquire them? If so, which company would you most like to see acquire T-Mobile? Let us know down below or on our G+ page.