A Dow Jones story by Ellen Sheng highlights some potential competitive implications of the AT&T/BellSouth deal, including impacts on the two DBS providers:
DirecTV recently extended a five-year partnership with BellSouth but either party can bow out if there is a change in control. [Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Tom] Eagan sees a likelihood that AT&T will kill that partnership with DirecTV, favoring EchoStar instead. AT&T currently already has an existing partnership with EchoStar and will likely want to work with just one satellite partner, rather than two.
DirecTV could see possible downside to its subscriber-growth targets, said [UBS analyst Aryeh] Bourkoff, who estimated that as many as 50% of DirecTV’s subscriber additions over the next three years could come from partnerships with carriers. EchoStar, on the other hand, would be able to offer bundled services to more homes.
Mitch Shapiro at 5:13 PM|Comments(0)
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