Verizon wraps up acquisition of Rural Cellular

It's taken more than a year, but Verizon has just officially announced that it has completed its purchase of Rural Cellular, which you may also know by its business name, Unicel. This latest announcement follows a conditional approval from the FCC earlier this week, which required one of the two companies to sell licenses in six markets in order to "improve competition" -- a compromise Verizon seems to have been more than willing to accept. All told, Verizon will be forking over $2.66 billion in cash and assumed debt for the company, which will increase its customer base by more than 625,000, and expand its coverage area by 4.7 million people, including markets in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Alabama, Mississippi, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Idaho, Washington and Oregon.

[tanjim @ Aug 7th 2008 11:41AM]

i remember a thread a while ago where everyone kept replying to one of these "first" comments just to annoy the asshole by filling up his inbox. lets do that again :)

[Dillon @ Aug 7th 2008 11:45AM]

I'm reporting your comment. It was offensive to my retina.

[Graham @ Aug 7th 2008 7:13PM]

Not to mention offensive to my anus.

[Luigi193 @ Aug 7th 2008 11:53AM]

Good news for Vermonters, who know will get AT&T (who gets some overlapping stuff to avoid a monopoly)... that means iPhones for us and our Cows!

[KomradeBototo @ Aug 7th 2008 12:09PM]

I'm right there with you! I got my iPhone yesterday in anticipation. Finally, the fifty nifty are actually covered.

[Cramit @ Aug 7th 2008 12:10PM]

Will this also lead to improved coverage in New Hampshire. I am trying to convince myself that the service is good enough to stay with AT&T and get myself an iPhone.

[Vijay @ Aug 7th 2008 12:00PM]

The interesting thing: Unicel is a GSM network, and Verizon is CDMA. As a ATT user, I depended on Unicel to get my service in Vermont. If all goes according to Verizon's plan, they will be transitioning to CDMA, presumably to eventually shut down the GSM service.

This is bad news for anyone who has a GSM carrier (ATT, T-Mo) and travels to rural areas covered by Unicel. What I'd give to have a national standard that all companies could develop on top of.

[kjb434 @ Aug 7th 2008 12:08PM]

Please read before jumping to conclusions.....See below

"Verizon Wireless will begin today to serve customers in Rural Cellular
markets that will be merged with Verizon Wireless' operations. The company
will continue to use the Unicel brand for the next several months, as it
works to integrate networks, and deploy CDMA technology and high-speed
wireless broadband service. Verizon Wireless will maintain Rural Cellular's
existing GSM networks to continue serving the roaming needs of other GSM
carriers' customers."

[Vijay @ Aug 7th 2008 12:27PM]

@ kjb434

Thanks for pointing that out - I absolutely did read the release, and I don't think it seemed as though I was jumping to conclusions.

I guess my "presumably to eventually" wasn't clear enough - I trust none of the telcos when it comes to maintaining technologies that help promote competition. Given Verizon's tendency to try and control the entire user experience, I trust them a little less. I wonder how this will play out in the real world.

[Mike @ Aug 7th 2008 12:32PM]

Uhm, Vermont Unicel isn't going to transition to CDMA. Where'd you hear that? Cite your source. Because if you actually read Engadget's source, you'd know that Vermont was one of the markets that Verizon is required to spin off to another carrier, and is not going to be converted to CDMA precisely because it would limit competition. Who knows who the new carrier is going to be, but the FCC chairman said it would be best if it was “the nation’s largest GSM carrier — [to] ensure that native Vermonters and visitors to the state who happen to have GSM phones will continue to be able (to) use their handsets.” So clearly the FCC hopes it will be AT&T, but we'll see.

SOURCE: http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080806/NEWS01/80805032

Don't jump to conclusions before you've become familiar with the situation, please.

[7on @ Aug 7th 2008 12:54PM]

Yeah, there needs so be some sort of global system for mobiles or something. When will an international organization for standardization come about and make these decisions!?!?!

[Aguiluz @ Aug 7th 2008 12:03PM]

What's with all the Phanbouy avatar rips?

Anyway, I never heard of Rural Cellular

[kjb434 @ Aug 7th 2008 12:05PM]

Well you've just showed how bigoted, close minded, and racist you are!

[Abe Froman @ Aug 7th 2008 12:40PM]

Not to mention Kansas, at least according to the map shown...

[murph @ Aug 7th 2008 12:13PM]

Vijay - as part of the deal, VZW has to sell GSM to ATT. So hopefully service will be improving, not disappearing.

[JerseyBricklayer @ Aug 7th 2008 12:18PM]

LOOSER

[shabutie11 @ Aug 7th 2008 12:22PM]

do people have to say first all the time?

[SeeScottRock @ Aug 7th 2008 12:23PM]

hi

[SeeScottRock @ Aug 7th 2008 12:23PM]

mom

[jonnylightning @ Aug 7th 2008 12:40PM]

dork

[happy_penguin @ Aug 7th 2008 12:39PM]

@jerseybricklayer

Looser than what?

[mykie @ Aug 7th 2008 1:09PM]

Hey, Jed!

Can you hear me now?

[briandfranke @ Aug 7th 2008 1:11PM]

So they paid $4,256 per customer, I don't really understand how that makes sense. Especially considering that most rural individuals don't have the need for data services that add a lot of revenue for cellular providers.

[fd @ Aug 7th 2008 1:24PM]

I thought in Maine Verizon is now Fairpoint Communications, or is that just the landlines & DSL and VZW still operates as Verizon.

[Bootes @ Aug 7th 2008 3:11PM]

Verizon Wireless is not Verizon, but Verizon does own a large part of them. Verizon decided to sell some rural landlines to fairpoint (home phones + DSL). It has no affect on Wireless.

[kansanpoker @ Aug 7th 2008 1:41PM]

does this mean , i can finaly get service with Verizon wireless , in the middle of no where , in Western kansas , like i can with sprint , i hope so , im so tired of sprints shit

[tanjim @ Aug 7th 2008 1:52PM]

haha, well i think his comment got kicked :)

but hypothetically, seeing as how he's still doing the same on all teh more recent posts, I'd say a hearty ha-ha to one of the posters that made a comment about how "firster" was only born cause the guy's dog screwed his mom first :)

[andy @ Aug 9th 2008 10:50AM]

I live in Sioux falls south Dakota where there is no AT&T. Also no iPhone. We do have local unicel coverage. Can anyone tell me if there is a chance we might be able to join the rest of the world with the ability to get an iPhone?

[Jason @ Aug 7th 2008 2:48PM]

Yes, because the Klan is real big in Vermont, which is one of Unicell's biggest market.

Idiot.

[Meg @ Aug 7th 2008 3:30PM]

Great so soon we'll get to pay more. And have less phone options since Unicel is GSM and uses SIM cards. Fun fun.

[WaterGuru @ Aug 7th 2008 4:09PM]

I find it interesting that VZW is also planning on divesting the networks in Minnesota and Kansas because on the planned merger with Alltel.

(http://news.vzw.com/news/2008/08/pr2008-08-07.html)

[TechieTriumph @ Aug 8th 2008 1:07AM]

and AT&T hasnt done this why?... i mean cmon, in my hometown its like one half is 3G and the other is EDGE. And I'm right outisde of Chicago! I need better coverage too but all in all the 3 to 4 bars I usually get , though with gen 1 it was 5 or none all the time, isnt too bad...I guess. Still, we need better coverage and more 3G availibility on the iPhone 3G.

[lee @ Nov 27th 2008 1:53AM]

take it from me verizon taking over unicell has caused nothing but nightmares in areas considered verizon extended network ,
you will incur roaming fees were you never had them before , my husband and i dropped verizon after 3 months of outragous roaming fees were talking hundreds of dollars that we never had until verizon acquired unicell, the new updated system and phones causes this to occur so buyer beware we were told that by updating the roaming capabilities of our phone using 228 updated our phones and caused pinpointing of where a call was made and had us incur roaming fees