Unbelievable: AT&T Buys A Smaller Carrier, Gets Bigger

In a move that is nothing short of unprecedented, unbelievable, and shocking, a large wireless carrier is purchasing a smaller wireless carrier. Said Gandalf the Grey on the issue: “Something is about to happen that has not happened in an age.” Whispers and legends have been told of such mergers of the gods, but none have ever been seen by the likes of man.

We talked to a Verizon CEO who had this to say:

“We’ve just never seen something like this happen before. It changes everything, really. We need to discuss it with the board of directors, but we may simply close up shop and let all of our customers know they should just head to AT&T. Unless we can find a strategy to fight this, we won’t have much choice. And, though I hate to be premature, I don’t think we will.”

AllTel, who was also on the phone, seconded Verizon’s feelings on the matter.

Meanwhile, Sprint was a little more optimistic:

We’re excited about the possibilities of this upcoming acquisition. Up until this point, we were able to tell our customers that, while we may not be as big as Verizon or AT&T, we’re still the third best and head and shoulders above T-Mobile, the only other national carrier worth mentioning. Now we don’t have that. We are the bottom rung. We’re excited to see how this is going to light a fire under our feet. We look forward to pushing forward with all the forward momentum we can move forward.

Nextel merely stood in the corner and shook its head.

One thing is clear, though. This move will change the industry forever. In what is surely a never-before-experienced-phenomenon, AT&T will become the largest telecom in a particular field. The implications of this alone are so far reaching that the U.S. market may never be the same. Said one Cingular AT&T executive on the subject:

It’s a little overwhelming, going from being the underdog to being the top of your field. It’s like “Whoa, just last year, no one listened to anything I say, and now everyone wants to know what we’re gonna do next. We’re the center of attention, and not only that, for the first time we actually have money to do all the cool and exciting things that you don’t get to do when you’re building cell phone towers in your garage. It’s a really exciting time and I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do.

For our parts, we at AD were surprised when the executive used the words “like” and “whoa”, though we probably shouldn’t be. It seems to be a trend of all the hip, up-and-coming, boy-wonder CEOs to continue to speak in the layman, even in official statements.

And, of course, the question on everyone’s mind is how will this affect the iPhone. Will future versions of the iPhone be available to what are currently T-Mobile customers? We reached out to Steve Jobs for comment. He punched us in the stomach and charged us $300 for the privilege. We happily paid, as it was the most intuitive, user-friendly beating we’d ever received.