WASHINGTON-FCC Chairman Michael Powell refused to say on Wednesday whether the Federal Communications Commission would allow Cingular Wireless L.L.C. to buy AT&T Wireless Services Inc. as has been widely rumored.
“I have a very strong policy. I don’t endorse or reject mergers that I have not seen the details of or reviewed,” said Powell. “A merger can be very, very good for the economy, or it can be very, very bad. And even in the time I have been here, I have been willing to approve mergers that were controversial, that I truly believed were good. And I’ve been willing to block ones that were popular but I really believed were bad.”
Giving a not-so-subtle jab to his predecessor Reed Hundt, Powell said he thinks “you cannot responsibly pronounce them thinkable or unthinkable without having even seen the constructs of the deal.”
In 1997, Hundt gave a speech at the Brookings Institute where he said a rumored merger between SBC Communications Inc. and AT&T Corp.-both of which had wireless subsidiaries at the time-was “unthinkable.”
Powell appeared at the National Press Club Wednesday to promote his view of the digital migration.
