Discovery Proceeding ‘Productively’ in Suit to Vacate T-Mobile/Sprint Merger

T-Mobile and the seven AT&T and Verizon customer plaintiffs who seek to vacate T-Mobile’s 2020 Sprint buy on antitrust grounds “continue to meet and confer productively on discovery,” and see no need for “court intervention on any issue at the present time,” said their joint status report Friday (docket 1:22-cv-03189) in U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois in Chicago. T-Mobile has produced a number of documents responsive to the plaintiffs’ first set of requests, “and will continue to make productions on a rolling basis,” said the report. The plaintiffs have also begun to meet and confer with AT&T, Verizon and Dish Network about their requests for production of documents to those nonparties, it said. The plaintiffs allege that the anticompetitive nature of T-Mobile/Sprint caused their own wireless rates to soar after the acquisition (see 2210110003). The parties agreed Thursday to dismiss all claims against Deutsche Telekom for lack of personal jurisdiction and improper venue (see 2403290002). U.S. District Judge Thomas Durkin last week granted T-Mobile’s motion to certify for interlocutory appeal to the 7th U.S. Circuit Appeals Court his Nov. 2 denial of T-Mobile’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit (see 2403280027). Durkin has scheduled a telephone status hearing for Friday.