When T was buying DTV, we in DTV were told that they really did not want our dishes, our boxes or our Techs - they wanted our sweetheart carriage rebroadcast deals with the content providers. T was also looking to ride our Latin American holdings to better pimp their cellphones into a growth arena.
As for their plans - I see T keeping a basic Sat presence for the rural customer at least until 2028 when the last of the DTV Sats dies in orbit. In the meantime, new customers and urban upgrade customers will be shoved into one of the 5 plans for streaming.
OTT Osprey will be their focus to WOW the young folks who are dying to watch reruns of their parent's shows like Friends. And HBO! Where else but here can you watch Hot Tub Time Machine 56 times in a month? We got what you want baby!
Back to the carriage contracts - today, Viacom started running a scroll on all 22 of their channels warning that T will drop them this Friday. Viacom accuses T of jacking the costs beyond reason and choosing to push their WM garbage over other channels garbage. I foresee many more blackouts as the legacy DTV content contracts expire in the next 2 years.
I go back to what has been said before on this site - if T wanted to be Netflix - they should have started 10 year sago. If they are hoping that Turner Classic Movies and CNN are going to save them - remember that everyday 20,000 Baby Boomers die of old age...and every quarter you lose another half million subscribers.
Spot on @Y9Hpp1a-1gom . Glad someone brought this up. Think that all the people that are concerned about the fate of DTV should read this. It should paint a better picture.