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Cingular Wireless to Become AT&T

By Nate Mook, BetaNews

November 21, 2005, 2:30 PM

Last month, SBC said it would adopt the AT&T brand name following the completion of its $16 billion merger with the company. But SBC did not say what would happen to Cingular, in which it controls a 60 percent stake. On Monday, however, the company confirmed plans to phase out the Cingular name and replace it with AT&T.

Although Cingular owners SBC and Bell South have made big efforts to promote the brand, SBC CEO Ed Whitacre says the company wants to use AT&T to market all of its products. Cingular had already acquired AT&T Wireless last year, and the SBC merger will bring with it a revamped image for the former Ma Bell. No date for the change was announced.

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By Neoprimal

edited Nov 28, 2005 - 1:09 PM

Now this is an example of a business rollercoaster and a slap in the face for all those people who cursed me out over my predicting the move. I remember when SBC merged up and I kept saying that they've all come from bellsouth and at&t and even though cingular owns att through the previous merger that the natural move after the sbc merger would be to all come back under the at&t name, which is, THE biggest name.
I also find the original ATT breakup moot as of now....because play by play after a fe years, they're pretty much back to what they were. If you check out the whole history, it was ATT....originally. ATT was broken up because it was too big and broken into smaller companies Bellsouth in the SE and Pacific Bell aka SBC (SBC is made up of a bunch of smaller bells) in anywhere there isn't a Bellsouth, which had become the biggest bell. Now check out the rollercoaster, SBC (Pacific Bell, SW Bell, etc) originally owned Cingular, which then merged with Bellsouth WIRELESS and kept the cingular name. So in essence, SBC Cingular became complete after the takeover of the last bell's wireless division.
There went the biggest of the 2 former fractured ATT companies, at least in the wireless division. Then, ATT Wireless merged with Cingular and kept the Cingular name, ATT was the division that kept the name after the company was broken up; they also would always stress that it had nothing to do with the phone division of ATT - woohoo, now all 3 of them are back together again. When I heard about the SBC and ATT merger, I said, that's it then...they've reformed into an even bigger company. People kept saying 'no, that's all wrong, this company is independent and that company is not related, etc. etc. etc.' now I hope they see it's not so.

All of these companies CAME originally from the AT&T breakup, and they've all now been put back together into 1 big company, which will again be under 1 big name. ATT, aka....Ma' Bell. So, remind me again exactly why they were broken up if a few years later they simply merge a couple times to form a stronger more dangerously 'monopolistic' company?

Score: 0

By jodoj80

edited Nov 24, 2005 - 11:26 AM

Let me know if I understand all this. I know that SBC and BellSouth are two different companies. But, I want to confirm a few thing's: Does AT&T Wireless merged from AT&T Corp? Were Cingular formed by BellSouth (40% owner) and AT&T Wireless (60% owner)? Does AT&T Corp bought or unified with AT&T Wireless?

The only thing that I know is SBC bought AT&T Corp are one company and BellSouth is an independent company. I'll appreciate some comments. I've been a using BellSouth for 4 long years in my house and Verizon for one year with my mobile service.

Score: 0

By Slimberg

posted Nov 26, 2005 - 12:51 AM

AT&T was broken up and its local service became all of the Bell companies (independently... Bell South, Pacific Bell, Southwestern Bell, ETC, ETC.).
SBC is actually a merge of 7 (out of 11) of the 'little bell companies. AT&T retained itself as a long distance company and formed a wireless company (Suncom).
Cingular bought AT&T's wireless service and Now SBC has merged with AT&T, this means AT&T has officially come full circle.

btw, i work for AT&T/SBC

Score: 0

By Black-Wolf

posted Nov 23, 2005 - 1:19 PM

Cingular was never good~~~
AT&T had too much radiation!!

Score: 0

By treworld

posted Nov 23, 2005 - 8:16 AM

This is the dumbest thing I've heard about in the buesiness world. AT&T Wireless had the worst reception anywhere. Cingular bought them out to utilize AT&T towers and increase their reception. Now, they're going back to the AT&T name??? What are they smoking? Mind as well change it to Sprint...

Score: 0

By drumcat

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 3:50 PM

Think of all the money they've thrown away with that terrible Cingular marketing scheme. Someone should be fired and blackballed for that momumental turd.

Score: 0

By ServerMechanic

edited Nov 22, 2005 - 2:38 PM

No matter how much perfume you put on dog poop it will still be dog poop.

Enjoy.

I think it's funny how big companies think they can "run away" by changing a name.

I'm sure that nobody remembers that AirTran used to be ValueJet. LOL.

Dummies.

Score: 0

By k0balt

edited Nov 22, 2005 - 1:25 PM

AT&T... Yikes! If they indeed switch Cingular back over to be associated, even by name, with AT&T, I will cancel my service and switch to another service.

The whole AT&T name just weirds me out... It reminds me to much of the Ma Bell days! :(

Also, why not use the money that they are going to use in changing the name on everything and instead use it to better their network? That is a whole lot of money to spend on a name change. Well maybe they have just tooo much money... and they are not going to get anymore of mine...

Score: 0

By improvelence

edited Nov 22, 2005 - 12:39 PM

The only Bar that cingular ever raises in the one that controls anger inside my brain. I have a signal in my kitchen but not in my living room, one on the right side of my bedroom, but not the left...when I walk through my house its like I am driving through the mountains. eff Cingular. Maybe now that we are back to ATT the signal will go back to the way it used to be....hah. But I always thought cingular was a stupid name, reminds me of an allergy medication or something for depression.

Score: 0

By tiefel

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 10:23 AM

With all the mergers/name changes there only one comment! ..|.. ..|.. Can you hear me now? GOOD!

Score: 0

By tannman1

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 9:48 AM

Now lemme get this straight, I had AT&T wireless who was bought by Cingular and we became Cingular...BUT SBC buys AT&T and becomes that name and since Cingular is 60% owned by SBC alas AT&T then Cingular now adopts the AT&T name....Gotta love it....Jeeeeze. Ei Ei O

Score: 0

By AntiochMedia

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 1:08 AM

My concern is that my wife and several people that I know were former AT&T Wireless customers and switched to Cingular under a little bit of confusion. They ended out with plans that were not as advantageous as their former plans and were a little bit irked by the transition. Seeing the old name AT&T come back in the place of Cingular isn't going to make anyone happy.

Why waste all of the money spent on advertising to build Cingular into a huge household name? AT&T is not a happy / friendly name anymore. As others have mentioned, AT&T symbolizes the past.

Score: 0

By wicketr

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 6:59 PM

Not a fan of AT&T. Don't know why. Just don't like BIG Business or their name. I know Cingular is big too, but AT&T is just the old way and Cingular is the new way. If anything they need to chunk "AT&T" all together and go to "Cingular".

Having the new unique name drew me to them. Now that they're going to be AT&T, I don't feel nearly as loyal to them as I did. I'm not going to enjoy saying I'm an AT&T customer AT ALL. Yack.

Score: 0

By MOGua

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 6:23 PM

Cingular's coverage sucks...so much for "raising the bar"

I live in Palos Verdes and Cingular doesn't work in my house.
My gf lives in Rowland Heights and Cingular doesn't work in her house.
Cingular drops very frequently when you are on major freeways in SoCal.
Verizon has none of these problems.

I've switched to Verizon for almost 4 years now and Cingular still has no signal at my house...

Score: 0

By nightops

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 2:08 PM

Odd, now Cingular and AT&T use each other's towers...so technically the reception has increased. However, if you area has 0 of either towers, then it won't help you in the slightest. My reception with Cingular has always been nothing but great. It has only improved in the last 2 years. I used to get 3 of 5 bars in my hometown area...now it's solid 5 for 95% of the time. Cingular is everywhere I normally travel...but hey, it's definitely not for EVERYONE. If you tried to get Verizon in my area, it would suck...you would never leave ROAM. :-) One man's trash...

Score: 0

By Neoprimal

edited Nov 28, 2005 - 1:23 PM

LOL....it depends on how the towers work.

OK, you know how if 10 people/computers use a 1Mb broadband connection, it stinks but if 1 person uses it, it rocks? Well....I'm beginning to think that cell towers work the same way....I need to read up on it. Why make such a stupid statement you think? Well, my wife has had ATT forever and it was really good. I was on the verge of switching when cingular took over. I hate cingular with a passion, they're vomiticiously greedy and even moreso than verizon (that says ALOT, cuz Verizon is, holy shi^ greedy). So, I was like..damn, pretty cool....now you can talk to ATT and Cingular customers free all day - till her service slowly degraded. Now, her cell drops calls when she's looking at full bars and she can no longer hold reliable conversations in our apt., which is the real gutbuster because her cell used to be like pots phone in the house. I have Tmobile, yes...yes...make fun of me - but as God or whoever you believe in as my witness, I now get pristine quality compared to her. As a matter of fact, I get better service than any of my friends who aren't on Tmobile. So, what could that be then? I don't know if Tmobile has as many customers as the rest, all I DO know is that I surpass nexsprint and attular by a landslide. I won't even bother with Verizon....cuz their ads should say "can you hear me now? Hello?, Hello?....hey, hello? ya, I can...wai...hello?

Score: 0

By improvelence

edited Nov 22, 2005 - 12:37 PM

I feel her pain.

Score: 0

By crashoverride

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 1:33 AM

You haven't seen coverage that sucks till you've had Alltel.

Score: 0

By doubleshot

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 9:52 PM

uhh, i live around there as well, i always have signal (with cingular) and if you've had verizon for 4 years you haven't had experiance with the new cingular, have fun with your outdated cdma phones...

Score: 0

By nightops

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 2:09 PM

Ah, but GSM can't do EVO or 1xRTT, which gives OUTSTANDING data service. I have Cingular and love the clarity and quality of GSM, however it still hasn't really been developed to top 144kbps on data.

Score: 0

By gawd21

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 4:56 PM

Cow patties and cow chips are the same thing just different names.

Score: 0

By scots

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 4:40 PM

This is just a name change and nothing more, so there shouldn't be problems like there were with the buyout and merging of Cingular and (the old) AT&T Wireless. There won't be any changes of billing systems, converting of towers, etc.

Score: 0

By wincement

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 6:23 PM

Ah. I should have picked that up earlier. There's no accounting for my thought processes though since I just took two exams =/

Score: 0

By plasmaleto

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 4:28 PM

Makes you wonder if BellSouth will continue to use AT&T Wireless as their cell phone carrier brand or if they'll try to branch off to keep from having to sport a competitor's product for them to make money.

Score: 0

By rijp

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 5:08 PM

Who do you think formed Cingular? Bellsouth spear headed the formation of the Cingular company, AT&T wirless is a partner in areas where Bellsouth/Cingular doesn't have coverage, they are NOT a carrier.

Score: 0

By Neoprimal

posted Nov 28, 2005 - 1:29 PM

Ehm...to my knowledge, that's kinda wrong. Pacific Bell spearheaded Cingular. PacBell then came under SBC with a bunch of all small 'Bell' companies. A few years ago, cingular came the way of bellsouth wireless and they merged. ATT Wireless and Bellsouth wireless have always been cousins because they all came from the original ATT, so was Cingular because it is really just an amalgamation of small 'bell companies' and the larger pacific bell (SBC). In any case....ATT WAS a carrier in itself. It's now taken over by Cingular.

Score: 0

By nightops

edited Nov 22, 2005 - 2:16 PM

Um...you're close. AT&T Wireless is owned by Cingular. Cingular now fully operates with all of AT&T Wireless's towers, so AT&T Wireless = Cingular. However, AT&T and AT&T Wireless are seperately owned companies. AT&T has more power and dominance in the home markets than Cingular does for obvious reasons. However, if SBC & BellSouth come back together, and AT&T Wireless is now owned by Cingular, which is now owned by AT&T, which is together owned by SBC & BellSouth, then legally Ma Bell just picked up cellular service to add to their list of in-house (read: non-divested) services. So that brings the following:

SBC & BellSouth
--OWNS--
AT&T (Cingular & AT&T Wireless)

So now 2 LARGE players in the cellular industry are owned by a large player in the residential/business telecom industry, which is then in turn owned by 2 of the largest telecom *providers* in the world. Basically, Ma Bell is coming back together legally through merger/acquisition, and adding cellular service to it's capabilities.

Score: 0

By scots

edited Nov 21, 2005 - 4:44 PM

BellSouth has already said that they have no problem with the name change. BellSouth has said "If the switch to the AT&T name helps attract customers to the wireless company - both carriers will benefit." Both carriers meaning (the new) AT&T who owns 60% & BellSouth who owns the other 40%.

Score: 0

By nightops

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 4:20 PM

Ok, I've been a Cingular customer for quite some time now, but this doesn't appear to be a big deal. As long as their support maintains decent service, and we get good signals, I really don't care if they call themselves the 'Flying Purple Lizards'.

Score: 0

By drumcat

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 3:47 PM

I had the original ATT wireless. Good service. In Seattle, when Cingular brought "more bars", they shut down towers and made my service at home go from perfect, to drops in less than 4 minutes every call.

Frankly, they suck. It's no wonder they have to swap names with a "quality brand". Cingular was terrible enough that I paid out the early term fee to leave. Losers.

Score: 0

By rijp

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 5:09 PM

Cingular has the worst, well AT&T actually is the worst, but Cingular sucks when it comes to Customer service.

Its on the FCC.gov website even. I did porting for another carrier a few years ago, and Cingular, AT&T and Nextel were the hardest to do business with.

Verizon is #1, across the board, hands down. Period.

Score: 0

By Iria

edited Nov 21, 2005 - 3:20 PM

Great. I was with AT&T Wireless, then they got bought -- so I am with Cingular. Now I'm back to AT&T. The worst part is they had a few months where auto-pmts were not working properly for some people, and website access was confusing. AND you had to go in and change your account to Cingular, didn't happen automatically (at least for me).

Score: 0

By rijp

edited Nov 21, 2005 - 5:06 PM

AT&T Wireless was never AT&T Telco. They were allowed to use the name, it was a interim company. When Cingular agreed to purchase AT&T the REAL AT&T wanted their name back so they could form THEIR own company, and call it AT&T.

And if you have ever worked for a Telco, NOTHING is ever automatic, SOMEONE has to initiate a change, and that's why your account wasn't converted. Its not Cingular's job to ensure you switched your account its yours. Its YOUR account, you make sure its working correctly. Its that simple.

Score: 0

By wincement

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 4:05 PM

Agreed. The rates were also more expensive when I switched. Hope they don't try to pull the same stunt again...

Score: 0

By krazy1

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 3:44 PM

I hear ya... I did the exact same thing

Score: 0

By Mike162005

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 2:45 PM

Did they not just change the name from AT&T Wireless to Cingular Wireless?

Score: 0

By gsbrock

edited Nov 21, 2005 - 2:49 PM

Yeah, they did... I left AT&T Wireless for Cingular about 2 years ago because AT&T's service used to suck... then they merged about 6 months or a year ago, and now I'm getting jammed back into it more or less. I don't really like the AT&T brand, so looks like it's time to switch again... I've heard good things about Virizon Wireless... anyone? lol

Score: 0

By Neoprimal

posted Nov 28, 2005 - 1:39 PM

I tested the Verizon service on the DC/VA/MD Metro and other areas - THE WORST service EVER. OMG - it was a nice phone too that my friend loaned me. He told me the service wasn't great but that his family had it and he wasn't paying the bill so he didn't care...LOL. Anyway, I really didn't like it at all. The calls weren't clear like cingular or tmobile, people sounded kinda funky on it and the calls would do this wierd blockout thing where you couldn't hear the person or they couldn't hear you for a while, but 1 person could hear the other person....I dunno how to articulately explain that, all I can say is it was odd. This is as bad as dropping calls in my book. Not only that but I don't think it's a good value unless everyone you know uses it. The social packages (text, pix, im, etc) SUCK, they're really expensive and you don't get alot of non-verizon packages.

Score: 0

By lemonlovr

posted Nov 22, 2005 - 12:35 AM

Seems that there's a lot of AT&T Wireless bashing here (at least the old ATTWS taht changed into Cingular). All of my experiences with ATTWS were excellent - great coverage and even better service. They even gave me a year of free nights and weekends (when that was still a rarity) for a simple billing error. I was heartbroken when Cingular made me switch from ATTWS. Now that it's becomming AT&T again really doesn't mean anything because it's still the same network that Cingular is now - just better. And...as far as Verizon is concerned, I have friends who have Verizon phones in the Chicago area and I think Cingular's service is far superior to Verizon's.

Score: 0

By Neoprimal

posted Nov 28, 2005 - 1:43 PM

I agree, when my wife had ATT, it was a nice deal. She got a nice bunch of minutes and the data plans (mmode) were fair. Cingular has wrecked her cell experience. The data plan is nasty, like 20 for semi-unlimited and the cell service itself is spotty. She's now thinking about jumping ship to Tmobile.

Score: 0

By joevaccarelli

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 4:29 PM

I have Verizon Wireless and they have the broadest network coverage in the country. No one is perfect, but I think Verizon Wireless is as good as you are going to get for cell phone service.

Score: 0

By betavirus1025

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 3:59 PM

Don't get too excited about any of this. It is going to be down to just 2 options, Cingular or Verizion. The only reason I got rid of Verizion is that they allowed themself to be bullied by the Rev Jackson into donating to his B*** S*** Rainbow Push fund. What a stupid move Verizion. Should have told the BSOB to stick it.

Score: 0

By heat_fan1

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 4:02 PM

I don't think Sprint is going anywhere anytime soon.

Score: 0

By Mike162005

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 2:54 PM

Yea, I had AT&T Wireless and then they change me into Cingular Wireless. Their service is not good where I live. I live in the country. They said that trees wouldn't affect the service. Well I know something is. I have to go into the city if I want to get service. They also like to screw up my bill. Thank god my 2-year contract is almost up. =)

Score: 0

By eddie

posted Nov 21, 2005 - 2:48 PM

Like a year or two ago I think

Score: 0

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