AT&T - DISH talks getting hot.

[mperdue]

It looks like AT&T is getting serious about acquiring Dish Network.

Article here

Mario

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Why do you think Dish wants to spin off the technology to a seperate company.

The writing is on the wall.

I don't know if it will be AT&T but someone will be buying and taking over Dish Network sometime in the future.

Echostar will continue to own the satellites, the technology and provider the hardware, but another company will run the operations of Dish Network.

 

[darrencp22]

The question is, is this a good thing? It would seem if someone like AT&T purchased Dish, it would be a nice influx of big $$$.

 

[RandallA]

Why do you think Dish wants to spin off the technology to a seperate company.

The writing is on the wall.

I don't know if it will be AT&T but someone will be buying and taking over Dish Network sometime in the future.

Echostar will continue to own the satellites, the technology and provider the hardware, but another company will run the operations of Dish Network.

Oh, I think it will be AT&T. They've been partners for a few years now and it's just a matter of agreeing on a price.

 

[darrencp22]

The other question is, would it be smart of Echostar to continue investing in something they plan on selling? Why add more programming, update software, etc if you're going to sell? They would just be losing money.

 

[Hall]

You don't operate a business assuming you'll be bought out. You have to continue to operate day after day as if you're in it for the long haul..... Besides, it's not like a buyout offer will just be a "break even" amount.

 

[schneid]

I'm Leary of AT&T

I am an AT&T Homezone customer. HZ seemed a good idea until it has become obvious to me AT&T has no interest in correcting its many short-comings. Real dish on the otherhand is constantly rolling out software fixes and new features.

 

[mdonnelly]

The other question is, would it be smart of Echostar to continue investing in something they plan on selling? Why add more programming, update software, etc if you're going to sell? They would just be losing money.

Look at DirecTV. They're in the process of being bought by Liberty Media, but it doesn't look like their programming additions were affected.

 

[darrencp22]

I wonder... if AT&T bought Dish.. would it keep it as Dish or would it rebrand the whole thing and make it into an AT&T product.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

If I had to guess it would be AT&T DISH Network.

 

[Neutron]

This sucks.

AT&T is horrible around here.

 

[pdxsam]

They wouldn't be spinning Dish out if it weren't close to being a done deal. Spinning companies out from the whole costs a tremendous amount of money to do. Charlie likes his money and isn't going to part with it just for the sake of having multiple entities.

 

[steve4810]

The question is, is this a good thing?

Absolutely!

My phone bill is always right and service changes are done instantly and right the first time. Dish on the other hand... My granddaughters would be a lot better at billing and customer service.

And I don't see ATT being interested in fiddling with the technology or station carry or not decisions. I'm thinking that would stay with folks in Colorado but hopefully the billing would get the once over from the folks at The Phone Company.

And if the installers ended up with jobs at ATT I think they would be happier.

I suppose the only losers would the small business owners that do installations and aren't ready to go to work for ATT. That really would be too bad. At least from the ones that post here they are a good bunch of folks.

 

[jpdubose]

I wonder how this would effect me. I got dish in a triple-play (phone/dsl/dish) package with CenturyTel. I would be kind of odd to have AT&T's logo show up on the CenturyTel bill every month.

ps. first post. I've been reading for about a month. Got dish at the end of Aug. Love it so far.

 

[ChrisPC]

What about all the ex-BellSouth people with AT&T/D* bundled? My mother-in-law just got the bundle a couple weeks ago. I guess they'll be converted over, like when D* bought Primestar.

 

[mdonnelly]

I hope it flys. I've been wanting to bundle Dish with AT&T phone and internet for a while now, but I don't want to drop Dish and give up all my HD for 6 months to qualify.

 

[steve4810]

This sucks.

AT&T is horrible around here.

Sorry to hear that but here in California we used to be PacTel and they were very good and during the change over I had reason to call customer service and they were pretty positive about being bought by ATT.

Since then I've had reason to call twice and they were still perfect. No wait and smart, pleasant folk who had access to a great database system that let them know and do everything right and do it right now. Everything Dish customer service is not. Though I've spoken so some nice folk there that just didn't have good info on their end and couldn't do sh** for me... Nothing that was their personal fault.

 

[Hall]

This sucks.

AT&T is horrible around here.

AT&T's possible DBS service would have nothing "local" about it so there's no "around here" to be concerned about.

 

[cracka]

Has the possibility of a Dish/DirecTV merger been completely nixed?

If not, could spinning off the hardware division be in preparation for that? Dish/DirecTV merge, with what used to be Echostar hardware as the exclusive hardware provider.

 

[Hall]

If I had to guess it would be AT&T DISH Network.

Let's see, they'd rename it "AT&T Satellite TV" first then people would complain, so they'd make it "Dish Network" again. After a while, they'll slowly 're-brand' it with "AT&T Dish Network"...

Look how they went back and forth with Cingular's name.