Posted on 09/27/2007 2:31:36 PM PDT by Las Vegas Dave
Washington, D.C. (September 27, 2007) -- AT&T has offered to buy EchoStar, the nation's second largest satellite TV service.
That's according to an article today from TheStreet.com.
The web site reports that AT&T has offered $55 a share, while the satcaster may be holding out for $65 a share.
The deal would seem to make sense for both companies.
EchoStar is under pressure to increase spending on several initiatives, including High-Definition TV, to keep pace with rival DIRECTV and the cable operators. AT&T could supply the financing, for instance, for EchoStar to launch new satellite to expand high-def capacity.
Meanwhile, AT&T's TV service, u-Verse, has just broken the 100,000 subscriber mark after more than two years. Buying EchoStar would give the telco more than 13 million video subscribers overnight.
TheStreet.com says Oppenheimer analyst Tom Eagan has raised his rating on EchoStar in anticipation of a AT&T deal. He believes AT&T would likely pay about $56 a share for the satcaster.
Both companies declined to comment on Thursday, TheStreet.com reports.
The pinged subjects will be those of HDTV technology, satellite/cable HD, OTA (over the air with various roof top and indoor antennas) HD reception. Broadcast specials, Blu-ray HD-DVD, and any and all subjects relating to HD.
Lasvegasdave
Dave, what are you using to get your HDTV here in Vegas these days?
Retired AT&T manager
I keep getting AT&T out of my life and it comes back in another form.
Me too.
AT&T is owned by SBC.....
You have freepmail.
Guess this means echo star will cease to function. Since AT&T bought out Cingular I’ve had more dropped calls in a week than I previously had in a year. Not to mention, AT&T has decided to add roaming charges if you even turn on your phone overseas.
I thought Dish was privately held by Charlie Ergen.
When I moved into our home in Garland, TX AT&T owned the cable company. Lousy service and reception. Then Comcast bought them out. Worse service. I soon switched to DirecTV and never looked back. (Now TimeWarner owns the cable.)
I hate these stories. I have a crappy little phone company and a fair cable TV company that gives me a pretty good connection speed. I’m moving across town next year to a nicer, bigger new home and the cable company won’t run line out there. So my only choice is to go back to some slow DSL connection speed with the crappy little phone company.
It’s a publicly traded company, although Charlie and his wife own huge blocks of the stock and virtually all of the voting shares.
I’ve known Charlie for many years and bought just 500 shares when he went public only because Charlie was running the show and I knew he was the world’s biggest cheapskate — it’s been one terrific investment and looks to be even better right now.
Probably a good thing- better than a Directv and Dish merger.
Same here with Cingular. We dropped it, got a cheapie TracPhone. Now it looks like we might lose Dish Network too. Ug.
I retired from SBC Operations...now the name on my pension check is AT&T. I hired on with Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company in Jan. 1971. PT&T was owned by AT&T. Retired from SBC just shy of 32 years.
Interesting.....
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