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13 Jan 2012 10:33

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Politics: Why Obama wants Congress to allow him to merge federal agencies

  • what President Obama plans to ask Congress for the right to merge together a number of sprawling trade and commerce agencies with somewhat similar purposes.
  • why It’s an effort to cut resources and minimize overlap, and the move would save $3 billion over 10 years. The election-year timing is also a consideration for Obama. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

25 Nov 2011 11:38

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Biz, U.S.: Off the table (for now): The AT&T merger with T-Mobile

  • what After a long back-and-forth with the government over the implications of the merger, AT&T said Thursday (that’s right, on Thanksgiving!) that they would not pursue FCC approval of a merger with T-Mobile.
  • why It looked very unlikely to get through regulators’ clutches. The merger would have effectively marginalized Sprint in the market, leading the FCC to call a hearing on the merger, and the DOJ to file an antitrust suit.
  • however Both AT&T and T-Mobile have much to lose from the stunted deal — AT&T in penalty fees (reaching into the billions) and lost infrastructure, T-Mobile in declining business. They will probably try again soon. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

31 Aug 2011 23:34

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Biz, Politics: Rick Perry: Totally backed that AT&T merger with T-Mobile

  • $500,000 from AT&T to Rick Perry source
  • » AT&T’s contributions = Rick Perry’s support? Back in May, Rick Perry told the FCC he backed the AT&T/T-Mobile merger. “I believe that this merger will continue to provide for great consumer choice, offer a wide range of service options, and spur continued innovation,” he wrote. He might’ve had a little help from those campaign contributions over the past decade. AT&T has a bit of a history of going out of its way to turn public favor its way, going so far as to bizarrely convince GLAAD to support the merger. With the Justice Department coming out against the merger and AT&T’s contributions to Perry coming under scrutiny, will Perry back down? (Strangely enough, BTW, the Justice Department’s James Cole made a statement that reads like the polar opposite of what Perry wrote: “We believe the combination of AT&T and T-Mobile would result in tens of millions of consumers all across the United States facing higher prices, fewer choices, and lower-quality products for their mobile wireless services.” Hrm.)
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

31 Aug 2011 11:15

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Biz: Justice Department attempts to block AT&T merger with T-Mobile

  • then A while back, AT&T announced it would attempt to purchase T-Mobile for $39 billion, in an attempt to shore up deficiencies in its wireless network. Other companies and consumer groups, most notably Sprint, loudly complained.
  • now Now the Justice Department’s trying to block the merger. “AT&T’s elimination of T-Mobile as an independent, low-priced rival would remove a significant competitive force from the market,” their complaint said. *BOOM.* source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Aug 2011 10:13

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Biz: How the cookie crumbles: Kraft to split food business in two

  • before About 18 months ago, Kraft (an already big global brand it its own right) bought an equally big global brand — Cadbury, a brand which sells much more than chocolate eggs outside of the U.S. It was a buyout that Cadbury long rebuffed, by the way. Because, really, who wants to mix Velveeta and Trident gum, anyway?
  • now The company, seeing that it had two distinctly different product portfolios with different strengths — groceries (like Maxwell House and Kraft cheeses) and snacks (like Oreo cookies and, well, Cadbury), decided to take these two halves and pull them apart, like an Oreo filled with sweet, sugary financial success. source
  • » Part of a larger trend: A number of other companies have followed this splitting-the-company path lately — including Motorola, Sara Lee and Fortune, Inc. And just you wait. In a year or two, they’re all gonna want to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

19 Jun 2011 22:56

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Biz, Tech: Skype’s rewarding executives for Microsoft merger by firing them

  • cause A little while back, Microsoft agreed to buy out Skype — an $8 billion agreement, the largest in the tech titan’s history by far. The deal, a surprising one by any stretch, just passed regulatory scrutiny.
  • effectBefore the company’s merger with Microsoft goes final, the comany is reportedly firing a bunch of top executives — timing it so that the workers don’t get full paydays for the merger. Lamesauce. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 May 2011 23:28

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Biz: Blatant evidence the FCC is in bed with big corporate entities

  • January After a long year of hand-wringing, including much complaining by consumer groups, the FCC approved the merger of NBC Universal and Comcast by 4-1. There was much teeth-grinding.
  • May One of the four commissioners who voted for the merger, Meredith Attwell Baker, has a new job. Wanna guess where? It rhymes with “bombast.” Or, perhaps, “total conflict of interest.”  source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

20 Mar 2011 21:30

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Biz: AT&T’s T-Mobile buyout: Infrastructure, antitrust concerns at play

  • 35 million subscribers on T-Mobile’s current wireless setup
  • 100M number of subscribers Verizon has, buoyed by a large infrastructure that nobody can touch
  • 95M number of subscribers AT&T has — if the merger goes through, they’ll top Verizon
  • 40M number of subscribers Sprint has; they were also having merger talks with T-Mobile source
  • » It’s all about infrastructure: AT&T is trying hard to play catch-up with Verizon, which not only has more customers and bandwidth, but also now has the iPhone. The bummer for T-Mobile users is that AT&T’s monthly rates are far higher than T-Mobile’s, which as you might guess has people worried. While T-Mobile has tried to get ahead of talk like this, the concerns are enough that many analysts are warning that the deal won’t go through.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

08 Mar 2011 10:50

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Biz: Could mobile also-rans T-Mobile and Sprint merge? It’s a possibility

  • who T-Mobile, the U.S. mobile carrier owned by Deutsche Telekom, is a fourth-place also-ran in the cell phone market, one that Apple doesn’t even think about.
  • what There are rumors that Deutsche Telekom will sell T-Mobile to Sprint, the third-largest mobile company, in exchange for a stake in the combined company.
  • why While the deal isn’t set in stone and could fall through, a combined company would make it easier for the two companies to build more infrastructure. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

06 Mar 2011 23:11

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Politics: Tina Brown, on relaunching Newsweek with The Daily Beast

  • Ironically, it was living in The Daily Beast’s fast and furious news cycle for the past two years that revealed to me what a newsmagazine can bring to the table when it’s no longer chasing yesterday’s story. It’s about filling the gaps left when a story has seemingly passed, or resetting the agenda, or coming up with an insight or synthesis that connects the crackling, confusing digital dots.
  • Tina Brown • Explaining in her redesign-launching letter what Newsweek’s relaunch means. She’s absolutely right, really – her time with The Daily Beast makes her pretty much the perfect person to play the role of editor of a newsmagazine in 2011. She can take the lessons from the Beast and build a shared vision between two entities which are designed to handle different parts of the media pie. We wish her the best. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
 
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