AT&T'S Quinn: We May Renege on 80%, 95% LTE Buildout

AT&T Senior Vice President Bob Quinn believes the recent Federal Communications Commission decision on mobile data roaming will "discourage investment and build out of broadband facilities." With U-Verse construction winding down, the only AT&T investment in broadband left to cut is the LTE network.

CEO Randall Stephenson has promised 80% LTE coverage in 2013 and 95% afterwards as encouragement for the T-Mobile deal. Even indirectly suggesting they might pull back on the buildout is risky given the likely struggle to get the T-Mobile approved. Stephenson's approach to their remaining broadband buildout is "about as fast as we can go." 80% coverage will require upgrading 10,000 or more cell sites, a big job even for a company the size of AT&T. It's easy to understand why he's pushing hard. AT&T is bleeding customers to Verizon since they lost iPhone exclusivity. They are a year behind on the LTE build. When the LTE iPhone comes out later this year, Verizon will have LTE in more than half the country and AT&T will be barely beginning. Verizon is going to 92% in 2013 and "all our territory" (95-99% of the U.S.) by a few years later. AT&T says its goal is 95% in 2016 or so. AT&T has already cut nearly all other "elective" capital spending on broadband.