Smartphone prices may increase for wireless customers, but AT&T otherwise faces no major challenges from higher U.S. tariffs (see 2505120050), COO Jeff McElfresh told a JPMorgan financial conference Tuesday. Handset prices are “a moving target” and are likely "going to rise,” he said. Customers “will bear the brunt” of rising costs “as they have over the last many cycles in the industry.”
Carriers concerned about rising prices for iPhones and other devices and gear from China got good news early Monday as the Trump administration struck a preliminary agreement to temporarily slash a proposed tariff on Chinese imports from 145% to 30%. “We have reached an agreement on a 90-day pause and substantially moved down the tariff levels -- both sides, on the reciprocal tariffs, will move their tariffs down 115%,” said U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
What the Trump administration's tariffs will mean for the communications sector remains murky (see 2504030056). On Thursday, the administration announced a deal with the U.K., the first of what it said will be multiple trade agreements.
The Consumer Technology Association wants House and Senate Commerce committee leadership to oppose NAB’s petition to the FCC on the ATSC 3.0 transition, CTA CEO Gary Shapiro said in a letter to legislators Tuesday. The letter was sent to Senate Commerce Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and ranking member Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and House Chairman Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., and ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J. Comments on the NAB petition were due Wednesday in docket 16-142.
Money, not technology, is the biggest hurdle to satellite providing "fiber in the sky"-like connectivity, said Michael Abad-Santos, Rivada Space Networks' deputy chief commercial officer, at International Telecoms Week on Tuesday. Satellite executives also discussed spectrum needs for satellite-delivered terrestrial connectivity. George Giagtzoglou, Omnispace's vice president-strategy and marketing, said reusing terrestrial spectrum will suffice in some areas. In others, there's already dense use of terrestrial spectrum and likely none to spare for a mobile network operator (MNO) to hand off to a satellite service, he said.
T-Satellite service will start in July at $10 per month, T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert said late Thursday on a call with analysts to discuss Q1 results for the carrier (see 2504240062). Sievert also expressed concerns about Trump administration tariffs and said that if they result in more expensive smartphones, consumers will have to pay the extra costs.
While the Trump administration has paused the most extreme of its proposed tariffs for now, they're still having a negative effect on the economy, S&P Global Warnings said Thursday. “We expect the PC and smartphone sectors will be most affected … while hardware issuers that focus on server, storage, and networking equipment products will be less affected,” S&P said. IT spending growth “will slow to 5%-7% in 2025 compared to our previous forecast of 9%.”
Carrier groups urged the FCC to move cautiously as it updates its Part 36 separations rules, which haven’t seen a major overhaul for more than 35 years. The rules remain important for many small providers, they noted in comments due Wednesday in docket 80-286. The FCC also has the ongoing “Delete, Delete, Delete” proceeding, which is examining eliminating rules of all kinds (see 2504140046 and 2504140063).
AT&T CEO John Stankey warned Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s tariffs could hurt the carrier, echoing Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg on Tuesday (see 2504220033). Unlike Verizon, which lost postpaid phone subscribers in Q1, AT&T reported 324,000 postpaid phone net adds in the quarter, buoyed by FirstNet.
Apple and Meta violated the EU Digital Markets Act (DMA), the European Commission said Wednesday in its first noncompliance decisions under the measure. It hit Apple with a $568 million (500 million euros) fine and Meta with $227 million (200 million euros). Neither company commented immediately.