What if There is No T-Mobile US Merger with Sprint?

It is possible to argue that a merger of T-Mobile US and Sprint makes the firm a stronger competitor to Verizon and AT&T, and for that reason underpins longer-term and sustainable competition in the U.S. mobile services market.

That argument largely rests on the ability of the new T-Mobile US, for example, to operate with greater scale, which should reduce costs, and take advantage of greater spectrum and other resources the combined company would possess.

But most believe T-Mobile US is a going concern, in any case, though an independent Sprint would continue to be in trouble .

And though company officials always argue consumers will benefit from lower prices, virtually no financial analyst buys that argument. On the contrary, most support the merger precisely because it allow higher prices and less competition.

There are limits to the number of tier-one firms that can flourish in any market, and recent debates tend to center on whether the sustainable number of providers is three or four.

But odds of merger approval seem to be worsening. All along, traditional U.S. antitrust guidelines have suggested that the proposed merger would occur in a context where market concentration would increase from an already-substantial level.

As an independent company, T-Mobile US has been growing market share. Virtually all observers might agree that is likely to continue, with or without a Sprint merger.

My own position all along has been that though both T-Mobile US and Sprint need to merge, the best outcome--in terms of competitive robustness and also supplier sustainability--would be for some combination of T-Mobile US and Sprint with Comcast and Charter.

That would give each of the mobile networks a big fixed network backhaul capability, which would better position them for 5G and beyond. Such mergers also would give the two big cable providers the mobility network they would require long term.

Those transactions would preserve, not reduce, competition in the mobile segment, and also strengthen the two cable giants as both move away from video revenue sources and towards core communications revenue.