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  "description": "He reiterated the carrier isn’t worried about satellite competition.",
  "path": "/at-t-cfo-fixed-wireless-expansion-still-surgical/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-06-09T18:56:54.000Z",
  "site": "https://broadbandbreakfast.com",
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    "See Breakfast Club Membership Options!",
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  "textContent": "WASHINGTON, June 9, 2026 — AT&T is expanding its fixed wireless base to drive convergence after a slower start than the other national carriers. The company is still trying to be “surgical” about the process, CFO **Pascal Desroches** said Tuesday.\n\n“Fixed wireless only makes sense if you are using your fallow capacity and don’t have to densify your network,” he said. “Once you do that, the returns on fixed wireless go down dramatically.”\n\nSee Breakfast Club Membership Options!\n\n\n                            See Breakfast Club Membership Options\n                        \n\nHe spoke at the Mizuho Technology Conference in New York.\n\nA November MoffettNathanson estimate put fixed wireless at half of all Verizon’s network traffic and two thirds of T-Mobile’s. The group wasn’t able to estimate AT&T’s use based on the company’s disclosures.\n\nAT&T counts about 2.3 million fixed wireless subscribers, compared to Verizon's 6 million and T-Mobile’s nearly 8.5 million (that’s as of the end of 2025, before T-Mobile stopped reporting subscriber numbers).\n\nDesroches said the carrier was still using fixed wireless to retain customers while the company builds fiber into its copper footprint, and marketing the service to small and medium businesses. Those companies tend to use less data than households, making them easy to add to an ultimately capacity constrained service, Desroches said.\n\nThe company is also using fixed wireless to drive convergence, he said, which wasn’t initially in AT&T’s plan for the service. Verizon’s CEO has said the carrier is doing the same.\n\nAT&T tends to have lower wireless penetration outside its traditional wireline footprint, Desroches said, and selling fixed wireless there is a good way to get people to bundle and sign up for mobile service as well.\n\nAT&T is acquiring spectrum from EchoStar, some of which it’s already turned on through lease agreements, that should provide more fixed wireless capacity. The company is also participating in the AWS-3 re-auction, which Desroches couldn’t talk about because it’s ongoing.\n\nStill, “I wouldn’t anticipate us to have to focus on those relationships to the same extent as you see some of our peers,” he said. “It’s not today, but at some point you’re going to have to pay the piper. That’s why we’re being much more surgical than others about it.”\n\n###  _Satellite competition_\n\nLike executives from the big three carriers have said previously, Desroches said he wasn’t concerned about competition from satellite broadband providers. SpaceX, which dominates the U.S. market, is planning a massive $75 billionIPO Friday.\n\nHe said for rural areas where it doesn’t make sense to deploy terrestrial infrastructure, low-Earth orbit satellite was a “great solution.”\n\n“But within urban and suburban areas, the infrastructure that is in place is better,” he said. “The cost per bit to deliver is cheaper, and those markets are competitive with well-established competitors.”\n\nCable companies like Charter have reported some increased competition from SpaceX in the rural parts of their footprint.\n\nDesroches said AT&T expected to be able to partner with “different satellite providers to help bridge the coverage where we don’t have infrastructure.”\n\nThe company has a partnership with AST SpaceMobile to provide direct-to-device mobile service, as does Verizon. AST has been behind schedule on launching its massive satellites, but is aiming to have up to 45 in orbit and begin offering service to some customers by the end of this year.\n\nThe big three carriers said last month they had agreed to form a joint venture that satellite companies could negotiate with to access all their spectrum resources for direct-to-device. Analysts saw it as an effort to prevent a SpaceX monopoly in the space, where it has big ambitions.\n\nDesroches said the joint venture, still not finalized, allows the carriers “to agree on a set of standards and principles that we’re going to use to deliver that service.”\n\nRural wireless carriers are not happy about the JV. The Rural Wireless Association said when it was announced that the group feared the big three ditching their roaming deals and offering solely direct-to-device partnerships in rural areas.\n\n“This coordinated service offering among the Big 3 nationwide carriers helps ensure that rural and regional carriers will be unable to compete effectively in the wireless marketplace, with the downstream effect of loss of terrestrial service and higher prices for consumers,” the group said.",
  "title": "AT&T CFO: Fixed Wireless Expansion Still ‘Surgical’",
  "updatedAt": "2026-06-10T21:47:05.432Z"
}