In January 2015, AT&T made its comeback bid to Mexico by completing its acquisition of Iusacell, allowing the U.S. giant to return to a market it had left first in 2011 by selling its stake in Alestra, and again in 2014 by selling its stake in América Móvil. This time, it returned to become a key player in the nation’s telecommunications landscape.
At the time, AT&T CEO/Chairman Randall Stephenson promised Mexican customers that the company would operate a single network across two countries. This was the much-touted “North American Mobile Service Area,” encompassing more than 400 million people and businesses on both sides of the border. The announcement held a coded message, a promise. It sought to fulfill an aspiration shared by many Mexicans: to enjoy the same services AT&T offers its customers in the United States, anywhere in Mexico.
Those were different times. The border had not yet withered under a barrage of political bickering, and the countries’ proximity was an advantage, with millions crossing the border each week for work, family visits, or shopping. Quite simply, the region’s economic integration justified integrating its networks. And, for those who have forgotten, the impact of the 2013 constitutional reform was only beginning to be felt, while the newly established Federal Telecommunications Institute (IFT) was demonstrating a high degree of efficiency.
AT&T bought Iusacell from Grupo Salinas for $2.5 billion and, weeks later, acquired Nextel Mexico from a bankrupt NII Holdings for $1.875 billion. Building on those acquisitions, it announced an additional $3 billion investment to extend its 4G network to 100 million Mexicans before the end of 2018. To make that promise tangible, it eliminated roaming charges. Mexican customers could use their minutes, messages, and data in the United States at no additional cost.
The problem was that this move didn’t create a competitive distinction; instead, it let competitors replicate the service on both sides of the border. T-Mobile eliminated roaming charges across the United States, Mexico, and Canada. América Móvil responded in July 2015 with a similar offering and, in the process, declared itself the leader in integrating the two markets.
From that point on, AT&T competed in Mexico as what it really was: a third operator facing a dominant incumbent with scale, spectrum, and distribution built up over decades. The company invested far more than it had initially announced, consolidated two disparate networks into a single 4G platform, standardized its retail network, and set out to win customers one by one. It built a truly national network and drove prices down across the market.
However, the investment fell short of initial expectations. AT&T’s comeback did not materialize, and it announced the sale of its Mexican operation a few months after reaching its eleventh anniversary. To understand the rupture between the U.S. parent company and its Mexican subsidiary, however, one must go back to September 2019, when investment management firm Elliott Management challenged AT&T’s acquisition strategy in a memo.
Its letter to the board recommended reviewing the portfolio, divesting businesses without a clear strategic rationale, reducing debt, and improving execution. The memo also questioned AT&T’s international expansion, saying it could not identify what each operation contributed to the company’s finances. AT&T Mexico was among the assets singled out as divestiture targets: despite the investment it had received, it remained unprofitable in 2019 and performed below expectations.
Elliott Management’s letter marked a break with AT&T’s thinking up to that point, a change of direction, and the beginning of a future in which the Mexican operation, despite sharing a border with the United States, appeared isolated. It is also worth recalling that the demands extended beyond an exit from Mexico to highly profitable operations such as those in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Their small populations worked against them, and selling them to Liberty Latin America for around $1.95 billion in 2020 helped shore up AT&T’s finances. Other moves inspired by Elliott Management’s letter include selling Vrio’s Latin American television business in 2021, spinning off WarnerMedia in 2022, and selling its stake in DIRECTV in July 2025.
While AT&T shed operations outside the U.S. telecommunications market, it also strengthened its domestic business by purchasing Lumen’s residential fiber business for $5.75 billion in February 2026. Quite simply, AT&T’s growth vision changed completely in less than a decade. The United States is the only market that matters for its consumer connectivity services. Its interest in international operations centers on the corporate market, which requires private networks and internet access, managed security, cloud connectivity, IoT, and enterprise mobility through roaming agreements with local operators.
Against this backdrop, Mexico gradually became an expendable asset for AT&T’s corporate headquarters, one it would let go if an offer arrived that it considered attractive and fair. It must also be acknowledged that the passage of time took its toll on the Mexican market, with the dismantling of the 2013 constitutional reforms, the abolition of the IFT, the authorities’ revenue-raising approach to spectrum allocation, and a new legal framework that has drawn numerous objections from market participants.
The sale of AT&T Mexico, announced in October 2026, seems like poetic justice, almost worthy of a telenovela. The foreigner who dazzled the bride with his luxuries departs, while the suitor who always loved her, and who was once forced to let her go, reemerges as her savior and true love.
Televisa, this time backed by Fintech Holdings, returns to the mobile business by acquiring the network that Iusacell, in which it held a 50% stake, helped build. Televisa has fiber infrastructure in Mexico, and by mid-2027, when the AT&T acquisition will probably have closed, it could have an all-fiber network passing 20 million homes. Added to that would be the country’s second-largest mobile network, with around 24 million lines before any customer-base cleanup. This is precisely the converged fixed-mobile model that AT&T never managed to establish in Mexico. The combination would give the new converged operator more opportunities to compete with Telmex and Telcel nationwide in home and mobile bundles.
It is impossible to say with certainty that a letter an investment management firm sent to the U.S. parent company in 2019 directly led to the sale of AT&T Mexico. What can be observed is that the memorandum marked the beginning of a shift in the U.S. telecommunications giant’s view of the market: its consumer strategy retreated to its home market, while its interests abroad became confined to the enterprise segment.
The competitive, technological, and regulatory landscapes in both Mexico and the United States also changed over the past decade. The threats and opportunities are now very different, and in this environment, keeping the Mexican operation did not fit the strategy for the years ahead.
It remains to be seen whether approval of this transaction will prompt a regulatory reassessment in Mexico, based on the argument that an operator with a national fixed network and the country’s second-largest mobile network could finally provide a counterweight to the dominant player. With Telefónica’s departure, following its sale of Movistar Mexico this year, Mexico’s telecommunications market will be anything but boring in the near future.
José Otero has spent 30 years advising regulators and operators in 50+ countries across the Americas, Europe, and Asia on the governance of emerging digital technology. He writes here on the widening gap between what digital technologies can do and the rules, institutions, and infrastructure meant to govern them.
Connect on LinkedIn or reach out at jfo@ictdconsult.com.
