at&t

AT&T CEO says he likes concept of handset financing

AT&T has looked at the idea of making consumers pay for their own smartphones in monthly installments, according to CEO Randall Stephenson.

The idea of handset financing runs counter to the current model of subsidizing phones at a lower initial price in exchange for a higher monthly bill. Under handset financing, consumers would pay an upfront fee for the phone, and then steadily pay off the phone's cost over the next few months.

In exchange, the consumer would presumably get a lower rate on their phone bill, and could conceivably leave whenever they want after paying off … Read more

AT&T narrows Q4 loss to $3.9B, sells 8.6M iPhones

AT&T posted a narrower fourth-quarter loss, which was again weighed down by a change in the valuation of its employee pension plan.

Reporting results today, the company, however, added 780,000 contract subscribers in the period, and sold a record 10.2 million smartphones, of which 8.6 million were iPhones.

AT&T posted a loss of $3.9 billion, or 68 cents a share, compared with a loss of $6.7 billion, or $1.12 a share, in the same period a year ago. Excluding the pension issues, an adjustment for the sale of its advertising … Read more

AT&T's U-verse blacks out for days in several U.S. states

Some AT&T U-verse customers are still without TV, Internet, or phone service after a days-long outage that knocked out access for hundreds of users throughout several Southern states.

"The issue impacting some U-verse subscribers has been tracked back to a software upgrade," the company wrote on its Facebook page earlier this afternoon. "We continue to work to determine when service will be completely restored. Our continued apologies for the inconvenience."

The outage began on Monday and was confirmed by AT&T on Tuesday. Hundreds of users have complained of no service on the … Read more

AT&T picks up Lenovo IdeaTab A2107 tablet

The Lenovo Idea Tab A2107 is now available for purchase through AT&T for $99 with a two-year contract or $199.99 without a commitment.

The 7-inch tablet runs Android 4.0, has a 1,024x600 pixel resolution, 16GB of internal storage, 1GB of RAM, and 1.0 GHz Cortex-A9 SC CPU. The Idea Tab A2107 also has a microUSB port, a VGA front-facing camera, and a 3-megapixel rear-facing camera.

The AT&T version of the tablet operates on 3G or Wi-Fi, but Lenovo also offers a Wi-Fi-only model. The Wi-Fi-only option, now available in stores, differs in … Read more

Surface Pro launches February 9

Tuesday's CNET Update is counting the converts:

Stories from today's tech news roundup:

- Microsoft announced that its Surface Pro tablet will hit stores Feb. 9. Unlike the Surface RT tablet, this Pro version will run any Windows program.

- A new report out says that Apple still holds the lead for U.S. smartphone sales, and that there are more people converting from Android to iOS.

- Verizon released iPhone sales data in its fourth quarter earnings report. Apple will release its earnings report Wednesday afternoon.

- AT&T announced it will spend $780 million to buy the U.S. carrier Alltel, … Read more

AT&T spends $780 million to buy more spectrum

AT&T is spending $780 million in cash to scoop up more wireless spectrum.

The company announced Tuesday that it is buying the U.S. retail wireless operations of a carrier called Atlantic Tele-Network or ATNI. As part of the deal, AT&T will acquire wireless spectrum licenses, network assets, retail stores and approximately 585,000 subscribers.

ATNI operates under the Alltel name in the U.S. Its network covers roughly 4.6 million in rural areas in six states including, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, North Carolina, Ohio, and South Carolina.

The spectrum licenses that AT&T is … Read more

Verizon Q4 loss doubles, pushed by Sandy, pension costs

Superstorm Sandy and mounting pension costs took a toll on Verizon.

The New York telecommunications provider posted a fourth-quarter loss of $4.22 billion, or $1.48 a share, compared with a year-ago loss of $2 billion, or 71 cents a share. The results were affected by costs associated with Superstorm Sandy, which devastated the Northeast region late last year, and by a change in the valuation of its pension liabilities owed to its employees. On an adjusted basis, the company earned 38 cents a share.

The pension liabilities cut into earnings by $1.55 a share, while the early … Read more

AT&T eyes international expansion for growth

AT&T is interested in buying a European carrier for growth, according to the Wall Street Journal.

With the U.S. market about to get more competitive, AT&T is looking at markets in Europe where it can upgrade technology and roll out new services and pricing strategies, the Wall Street Journal said, citing unnamed sources. It reported that AT&T is studying potential acquisitions, and could strike a deal by the end of the year. In particular, AT&T is looking at the U.K., Germany, and the Netherlands.

While the U.S. carriers have … Read more

AT&T opens FaceTime to all tiered-data customers

AT&T said today that it will allow any wireless customer with a tiered-data plan to use Apple's FaceTime videoconferencing app over AT&T's cellular network.

This is yet another change to AT&T's policy for this app, which when it was first introduced on the iPhone 4 was restricted to Wi-Fi networks only. In Apple's iOS 6 release of software, all FaceTime enabled iPhones were then capable of operating the app over a cellular network. Initially, AT&T still restricted usage to Wi-Fi.

In August, AT&T started to open … Read more

BlackBerry 10 to be carried on AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile

With BlackBerry 10's big debut coming at the end of this month, three major U.S. carriers have confirmed that they will carry devices on this new platform, according to Reuters.

AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile USA all said that they plan to support BlackBerry 10 handsets on their networks.

"We're extremely optimistic that it's going to be a successful product and our business customers are extremely interested in it," T-Mobile USA chief executive John Legere told Reuters.

Verizon's chief executive Lowell McAdam also confirmed the carrier will support BlackBerry 10 devices. And … Read more