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Jeff Causey
Guest
Earlier this year AT&T announced they were going to enter the market for in-flight wireless services. The carrier indicated they were responding to feedback they picked up on from air travelers who were frustrated with the service offered by current market participants like Gogo and Row44. In a statement issued on Monday, AT&T has announced they are abandoning their plans and will “no longer pursue entry into the inflight connctivity industry.”
Since the announcement about the in-flight service, AT&T has launched some other major initiatives. Most recently the company announced a $2.5 billion plan to acquire Mexican wireless carrier Iusacell and earlier this year AT&T announced plans to acquire DirecTV. AT&T indicates it believes these investments are more “transformative” and will prove more valuable in the long run.
At least on industry analyst, Henry Harteveldt with Atmosphere Research thinks another contributing factor may be the maturity of the in-flight Wi-Fi market. According to Harteveldt, most of the airlines serving North America are probably already locked in to exclusive deals with existing providers, making market entry especially difficult. On top of that, AT&T probably was not offering anything unique.
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