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Dish Network (And Its New 5G Network) Is Probably Doomed
from the this-was-all-painfully-obvious dept
Satellite TV provider Dish Network isn’t having much fun. Despite oodles of direct government assistance during the Trump era, the company’s attempt to pivot from mediocre satellite TV provider to modern streaming TV and 5G wireless giant has been a consistent dumpster fire.
Both the company’s dying satellite TV service and its streaming TV platform (SlingTV) have been bleeding customers, and Dish’s supposed 5G network, the byproduct of a doomed Trump era effort to “fix” the competitive problems caused by the Sprint/T-Mobile merger, looks to be a hot mess. And that was before the company was recently hacked, knocking systems offline for weeks.
We predicted this would go poorly back in 2019. Dish had no experience in wireless, CEO Charlie Ergen is notoriously difficult to get along with, and the remaining three wireless carriers would likely work hard behind the scenes to ensure Dish never became a viable competitor. And as expected, Dish’s early 5G launch was laughable in terms of network reach and phone availability.
And while the telecom trade press has been happy to play along with the idea that Dish has the competency and funds to build a nationwide 5G network, the better part of five years later the industry and the press are finally starting to realize that Dish is probably doomed:
Dish Network appears increasingly desperate to sell assets and raise money — and continues to battle speculation from insiders that it could face bankruptcy, On The Money has learned…The struggling satellite-TV giant is expected to meet its commitment to cover 70% of the US with a 5G wireless network by the end of the month, but sources are growing increasingly skeptical that Dish will have money to finish its buildout.
By a network that “covers” 70% of the US, they mean a network that can technically reach 70 percent of the U.S. population, which is (as you probably know) mostly huddled around cities. There’s no requirement that this network actually work well, be affordable, or provide modern handsets. And it certainly won’t work if Dish goes bankrupt.
Dish’s next hurdle involves a 2025 deadline to push that number up to 75 percent. But that additional five percent involves starting to extend the wireless network into the kind of rural markets wireless carriers historically don’t find worth it due to high cost. I’d wager that Dish fails completely before 2025. At which point the FCC (especially if under Republican leadership) will dole out a wrist slap, if they punish Dish at all.
It always seemed to me that Dish’s pivot to wireless was a desperate retirement ploy for Charlie Ergen.
While I do think Ergen was hopeful a long shot pivot to wireless would work, the more likely plan B involved letting the company’s massive and hugely valuable spectrum assets appreciate, half assing a 5G network, stringing historically feckless FCC regulators along for a few years, then selling the whole thing to somebody like Verizon on their way out the door. That latter outcome always seemed more likely.
Trump-era “antitrust enforcers” desperately needed something to justify consolidation in wireless, and Dish Network’s plan arrived just at the right time in 2019. So FCC officials didn’t even bother reading about the Sprint T-Mobile merger impact before approving it. And Trump DOJ “antitrust enforcer” Makan Delrahim worked in his personal time to make sure Dish got what it wanted.
The end result will be more consolidation and less competition, precisely what most of these folks envisioned all along. As usual, the losers will be consumers and the thousands of employees who lost their jobs along the way, and the regulators who greenlit this doomed turd of a plan will move on to some other bad idea, perfectly content to pretend none of this ever happened.
Filed Under: 5g, bankruptcy, competition, consolidation, fcc, mergers, spectrum, telecom, wireless
Companies: dish
Comments on “Dish Network (And Its New 5G Network) Is Probably Doomed”
The word “despite” seems to suggest the government assistance was meant for some purpose other than enriching the company executives and shareholders. An extraordinary claim like that would require evidence. And despite this story treating the word “bankruptcy” as a mark of failure, I don’t think that’s how billionaires, such as CEO Ergen, see it; it’s a tool some of them use frequently.
Maybe playing with the FCC is what Ergen finds “fun”. Being a 70-year-old billionaire, there’s not much need for more money. “Hope” doesn’t mean shit in business, being below even “expect” or “forecast”, so “plan A” is basically equivalent to buying a few lottery tickets for the kids.
But I don’t see anything “desperate” about the overall strategy. Collect as much money as possible for as long as possible. Appreciating assets are a bonus. Government money is great, ’cause it’ll take them a few years to realize they didn’t attach any meaningful conditions. Then there’ll be a multi-year dance of “we’re thinking about imposing conditions”, “wait! we’ll try to spend it better”, “hey, you didn’t! We might consider forming a committee to evaluate cutting you off”; and, of course, all the partisan bickering that goes along with that and delays any meaningful response. It’s not all that different from the “successful” broadband companies.
I thought at the time that this portraying Dish as a 4th wireless provider replacing Sprint was a lot of nonsense.
And it still looks like a lot of nonsense. The reality is, with 3 wireless companies, and 2 wireless operating systems, the public is being price gouged, as intended. This is Citizens United capitalism on display.
The only hope for Dish is if some cash rich party, like Amazon bought them.
Great Satellite
I disagree with your opening: “the company’s attempt to pivot from mediocre satellite TV provider to modern streaming TV and 5G wireless giant…”
DISH built a great satellite TV service and great home electronics like the Hopper/Joey DVR. It did so despite the powers against it including CATV, CNET, and Tivo. Ergen overcame a lot of barriers and forces. I thought they were doomed when one of their early satellite exploded and sold my stock (big mistake).
That said, the entrenched forces of cellular are probably much bigger and now DISH has more to lose. Not to mention pivots are hard. So, I do agree with most of this post, but give the guy and company some credit where it’s due.
It is likely the past success that convinced him to take on cellular. We do need DISH to be successful, but that’s not going to be enough.
Re:
…25 years ago. Any TV service that just sends scheduled programming, rather than on-demand programming, counts as “mediocre” now. For a while, people were fine with the “on-demand illusion” of Digital Video Recorders; but it’s been clear for a decade that it’s not good enough, that they’re well on their way to obsolescence.
Dish Network does not have nearly enough satellite bandwidth to run a modern service—even Starlink probably doesn’t—and it seems unrealistic to assume they’ll fix that with 5G. Whether or not Dish was amazing in the past does not seem relevant to anything Karl wrote.
Re:
Stock is cheap right now $6 a share.. load up I know I am
Is this how babies are made?
So the “merger” created a baby and that baby is not going to make it. Is this an abortion?
Didn’t you say..?
All those cries about higher cost? Mind pointing them out to us? My T-Mobile bill hasn’t changed. And my service coverage at 5G keeps getting better.
Why is it that every time someone doesn’t like some merger they cry like a baby. Then when all their complaints don’t materialise, they point somewhere else.
The T-Mobile merger has made the service better for both tm users and the formerly neglected sprint users.
Dish has always been a joke.
Dish is an amazingly good company run by a visionary and their embrace of the low frequency spectrum and Open-RAN network architecture proves it. They will probably be the best wireless provider 5 years from now. Just bought 2 ATT Calypso phones from Wal-Mart to take advantage of big new ATT tower in my neighborhood and neither one of them could even be activated. The big 3 are moribund bureaucracies loading over outdated tech. My money’s on DISH.
Layoffs have started!
Without warning, DISH laid off quite a few number of people just within the last 7 days within its customer service department. The timing for “business needs” came as a blind side for many of us. I am just glad I was forced off the boat before it goes completely under, without warning! Our department managers brush everything under the rug, as it has been for many years. Since republic wireless was something we had to shove down the throats of pretty pissed off customers, we were getting into shoving the Hopper Plus down customers throats, while DISH KNEW that the Hopper Plus was released with many bugs in it. Don’t fall for DISH any longer. Here we are being loyal to a company that wouldn’t piss on our gums if our teeth were on fire, as Eric Worley sits in his luxurious 40 acre ranch surrounded by trees.
Re: Article lacks credibility and factual information
As a labor law specialist who has a close connection to Dish and a few of their contractors, I am privy to much of the internal workings. The article sites no direct sources and I wonder exactly where they’re getting their information from. I am not here to defend Dish, or any of its subsidiaries since I am a neutral party and provide support for senior leadership making tough decisions. Additionally, I’m not an ardent supporter. This company is no different than any other organization I have worked with in my 40+ years. There are good people and toxic people. There are good decisions and bad, but that is anywhere you go. I challenge much of the above article because it lacks serious facts. Dish is and will always be a cash cow, regardless of new and/or existing projects. In fact, their accounting and budgetary departments are some of the best I’ve ever seen. Furthermore, I have only seen positive and well-intended decisions. Let’s face it, nobody can be right all the time; however, Dish is extremely innovative. If you look closely at who they hired and contracted with, you’ll know that they hired the absolute best to manage and oversee this project, arguably without sacrificing quality over quantity.
The 5G service just launched last week. Prior to that, all cities and AOI markets were simply a soft launch. Frankly it is egregious, slanderous and downright dirty, not to mention, completely false to make statements regarding the network capabilities. If you have any knowledge of telecommunications and understand the internal workings, you would actually be pretty amazed at the fallout vs. success rates of services provided utilizing all and any handsets that are considered certified devices.
Go back and do your homework. Try talking to experts in the field who have direct knowledge before putting a company on blast. Are there kinks to work out?! Of course there are but once again, I can tell you that I have seen nothing but a stellar performance from their launch team. They have worked endless hours, and have some of the most sophisticated expertise in the field.
Lastly, I’ll say that I am a loyal, and committed TMO customer and have no plans on changing networks. Yes, you could say then that I’m full of it, and cannot put my money where my mouth is. To eat your own. Dish is and will always be a close second, but for now I am happy with my services with TMO. I’m not a grass is greener on the other side type person so I’ll continue to be a loyal customer. They have done nothing wrong to me. But, if anything were to happen in the future, I would have no problem choosing Dish. The metrics and success rates on their metrics speak for themselves and I have seen them every day for the last few months.
Dish put a tower on one of my apartment buildings. One of the worst companies with the nastiest people I have ever encountered in business for over 30 years. I do not get the impression they are serious about their cell business. All I hear is that the government forced them to do it. Culture starts at the top and it is clear their CEO sets the tone. As an attorney, I have dealt with a lot of business people and every person I have dealt with at Dish has been at best nasty and at worst unscrupulous.