Reuters reports that Time Warner Cable, the second-largest U.S. cable television operator, is mulling an entrance into the U.S. wireless telephone market, Chief Executive Glenn Britt said today.
Its mobile phone options include renting space on an established wireless network and reselling existing services through a joint venture, Britt said at the Reuters Telecommunications, Cable and Satellite Summit on Monday.
Britt also said Time Warner Cable could make an investment in a wireless company, either alone or as part of a consortium of cable companies. But he all but ruled out buying a wireless service outright, due to the size of the national services. He did not put a timeline for Time Warner entering the wireless market.
Some industry experts at the summit said cable companies should make decisions about wireless as soon as possible.
Building or buying a wireless network could be the only option for cable operators, say some observers. Some cellular operators have telco affiliates competing with cable.
Cingular Wireless, partially owned by SBC, and Verizon Wireless, partially owned by Verizon are both competing with cable. That leaves the No. 3 Sprint/Nextel and T-Mobile USA as possible partners.
Sprint/Nextel is an obvious play. Too boring.
But what about a Clearwire/T-Mobile deal brokered by SK-Earthlink? That could deliver both cellular and mobile WiMax. T-Mobile has the towers and cellular frequencies, Clearwire has mobile WiMax for public service and SK has broadband wireless application software and could deliver MobileTV services.
It’s all so obvious. Why don’t these people listen?
Related DailyWireless articles include; Cable Modem 3.0, Cable vs Digital Cities: Championship Fight, Telco TV Architecture, Wireless Cable, Comcast Adds VoIP, Wireless Cable Modem, WiFi Cable Modem/Phone, Regional Roaming Roundup and Time/Warner Cable Zones.
