AT&T Completes the Purchase of Assets from Verizon Wireless

On Tuesday, mobile phone carrier AT&T announced the completion of the purchase of wireless assets from Verizon Wireless. According to the company, the deal is meant to enhance its coverage in primarily rural areas in 79 service areas across 18 states. Verizon Wireless agreed to divest the properties included in the deal as means to receive regulatory approvals for the acquisition of Alltel in 2009. As soon as the network transition is completed, a number of around 1.6 million subscribers should benefit from AT&T’s 3G mobile broadband network.

“Mobile broadband is changing how we live our lives and transforming every sector of business, and AT&T is leading the way,” said Ralph de la Vega, president and CEO, AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets. “We’re excited that with this acquisition, AT&T will bring the benefits of mobile broadband to new subscribers. We mobilize everything for our customers by delivering the best 3G experience, the fastest 3G speeds nationwide, the most popular smartphones, an array of emerging devices like eReaders and netbooks, the ability to talk and browse the Web at the same time and access to more than 225,000 apps.”

As part of the transaction, AT&T’s wireless network coverage should be expanded in primarily rural areas of Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia and Wyoming. According to AT&T, it should launch service on a market-by-market basis over the next 12 months. Subscribers won't see any changes to their existing services, phone numbers and the likes. However, they will be offered the possibility to select a new device from AT&T at no cost, comparable with what they have at the moment, or to get upgraded handsets.

AT&T is set to inform subscribers on the changes that should be performed to their contracts or plans. At the same time, it announced that it planned on making the transition as easy and as convenient as possible. The re-branding to AT&T should be performed on a market-by-market basis too. According to the agreement between the two wireless carriers, AT&T is to pay approximately $2.35 billion in cash for the assets. Most of the properties are former Alltel assets, but there are also some from Verizon Wireless, along with others from the former Rural Cellular Corporation.