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The three largest US carriers announced an agreement in principle on May 14 to form a joint venture that will pool spectrum resources and build shared satellite direct-to-device infrastructure to close coverage gaps in rural and underserved areas.

FCC bureaus approved the transfer of 65 MHz to SpaceX for $17 billion and 50 MHz to AT&T for $23 billion on May 12, conditioning the deals on a $2.4 billion escrow account for tower-company claims.

The three largest Open RAN operators are scaling deployments in 2026, with AT&T past 50% of its Nokia-to-Ericsson radio swap and targeting 70% open-capable traffic by year-end.

The FCC will vote on March 26 to eliminate Section 214 and Section 251 barriers that slow copper network retirement, potentially freeing billions in carrier capital for fiber and wireless broadband.

NVIDIA launched IGX Thor at GTC 2026, bringing safety-certified edge AI to factories, hospitals, and rail networks as AT&T, Cisco, and a dozen hardware partners build commercial deployments.

AT&T commits $250 billion through 2030 to expand fiber, 5G, and satellite networks, but analysts question how much is new spending versus relabeled costs.