Dish Network could be in some financial trouble, as its deadline to cover 70% of the US with 5G comes up next month. The company is expected to meet that deadline, however, the company is going to need to spend billions more to cover 75% of America by 2025. And that’s billions that Dish Network does not have right now.
That brings us to Dish Network and DirecTV's potentially merging. The two have been posturing and position around a merger publicly for a few years. They are the two largest satellite TV providers in the US, and with cord cutting accelerating, a merger is likely inevitable. But now, the talks have stalled, reportedly.
Both of these satellite TV companies have their own Streaming TV service. With Dish Network having Sling TV, and DirecTV having DirecTV Stream and DirecTV via Internet, which are basically the same service. Clearly both companies know that streaming is the future, and it would make sense for the two of them to finally merge.
This would be a similar merger to Sirius and XM satellite radio merging 14 years ago, to form SiriusXM. If Dish Network and DirecTV did merge, they could end up being a viable competitor to AT&T. With DirecTV’s satellite and streaming TV service, and Dish’s services along with its internet business.
Now the other big question is, even if they do come to an agreement, would the regulators allow this deal to go through? Since they are the only satellite TV providers in the market right now, there’s likely going to be some pushback. Then again, satellite TV is dying, and this merger would be more about Internet and streaming TV, so it could be allowed to happen.
We’ll likely see a lot more about this potential deal in the coming weeks, especially if this while thing is one side trying to pressure the other into meeting their demands.
