{"slug": "at-t-ceo-john-stankey-stays-strong-on-the-carriers-ai-support-stance", "title": "AT&T CEO John Stankey stays strong on the carrier’s AI-support stance", "summary": "AT&T CEO John Stankey said the carrier is well positioned to support and profit from a surge in AI-driven data traffic, citing its expanding fiber and wireless assets, and downplayed the need for further acquisitions or satellite deals. Stankey told investors during the latest earnings call that AT&T expects to operate the most advanced U.S. communications network by the end of the decade, built on dense metro fiber and deep nationwide spectrum, including a strengthened 600 MHz low-band position for AI traffic. The carrier saw a $1 billion year-over-year increase in capital expenses in Q2 as it works toward passing 60 million premises with fiber.", "body_md": "AT&T CEO John Stankey said the carrier remains well positioned to architecturally support and financial benefit from a surge in AI-derived data traffic that the carrier is currently witnessing, downplaying any need for further acquisitions or satellite-based connectivity arrangements.\n\nStankey told investors during the carrier’s latest earnings call that it was already seeing a “rapid increases in large-scale data traffic, which demands high-capacity metro and inner-city fiber infrastructure. As AI fundamentally changes how consumers and businesses connect, it will drive a fundamental change in their expectations for connectivity.”\n\nThe executive added that AT&T was well-positioned for that challenge, touting the carrier’s growing fiber and expanding wireless assets.\n\n“By the end of this decade, we expect to operate the most advanced and technologically open communications network in the U.S. built on a foundation of dense, interconnected metro fiber and deep nationwide spectrum,” Stankey crowed. “This is exactly the asset base we want as AI begins to shape the next era of connectivity, and I wouldn't trade our assets for anyone else's.”\n\nThat network depth includes the ongoing organic expansion of its fiber footprint as well as the [ongoing integration of fiber-based acquisitions](https://www.sdxcentral.com/news/att-completes-575b-acquisition-of-lumens-mass-market-fiber-business/). Those two avenues drove an uptick in capital expenses during the first half of the year, with a specific $1 billion year-over-year increase during the second quarter alone.\n\nThe carrier is currently working toward a fiber footprint [passing 60 million premises](https://www.sdxcentral.com/analysis/verizon-att-fiber-feasts-flesh-out-footprint-fight/) by the end of this decade and driving an increase in enterprise-derived revenues.\n\nStankey also positioned AT&T’s [more robust 600 MHz low-band spectrum position](https://www.sdxcentral.com/news/att-ceo-admits-to-high-price-for-echostar-spectrum/) as a way to better serve AI-based data traffic across its wireless network.\n\n“We believe the best way to manage a robust upstream in an agentic environment is to have a really strong low-band position, and we already have an advantage low-band position in the market,” Stankey said. “The 600 is going to make that advantage even more substantial, and because you can engineer the spectrum a little bit differently given how those bands are set up, we intend to try to engineer a really robust upstream network that reaches deep into buildings and has a lot of consistency to it. And we think that's what the low band is going to allow us to do.”\n\nStankey’s comments came on the heels of CFO Pascal Desroches [previously boasting](https://www.sdxcentral.com/news/att-exec-boasts-ai-doesnt-exist-without-our-connectivity-plain-and-simple/) that “AI doesn't exist without our connectivity … plain and simple. And we know one thing for sure that data consumption is going to continue to go up under AI.”\n\n## No further deals needed, including satellite\n\nStankey during the latest earnings call also countered any potential question about the need to further expand connectivity options, noting, “we aren't missing any critical elements necessary to execute our strategy We have the necessary building blocks in place, the technology agreements and assets for our strategic path forward. The enabling connectivity to the future is in our hands today.”\n\nThat appears to continue to include satellite aspirations, though Stankey does see “corner cases” where satellite-based connectivity can be melded into its operations.\n\n“I do believe there'll be areas that satellite might serve adequately that allow us to maybe shrink our terrestrial footprint on what I would refer to as ‘poverty sites’ – sites that sit out there and pick up relatively small amounts of traffic, but provide continuity of connectivity and that might be able to positively impact our cost structure in those instances, and at the same time give the customer a really good experience. So I do expect rural characteristics of our business to change,” Stankey explained, adding that this will also allow the carrier to take costs out of serving those areas.\n\n“As you know, in the fixed part of my business, I'm trying very hard to shrink footprint. That's all the comments I made about shutting down wire centers and going to zero customers. I want assets out of those areas. I want to take costs out. I don't want to be prevalent there,” Stankey continued. “Where I want to be prevalent is where I can build fiber, and where I can use fiber to put wireless transmitting entities at the end of it, edge points, and use those networks effectively in consolidating traffic.”\n\nStankey noted specifically that this plan is targeted at geographic areas where AT&T sees just a small percentage of network traffic, areas where potential satellite-based partnerships could be put into place.\n\n“That's the fundamental underpinning of the business we want to build and then establish paired relationships or joint relationships with other providers to fill in that small percentage of the time that the customer walks off our network. That 2% of the traffic that maybe we can't get on that infrastructure,” Stankey said. “I like coming at the customer where we own and operate 98% of the traffic. We have control of it. We have control of the product and the service that we offer, and that maybe we do the integration and leasing on the other 2% as opposed to the other way around.”\n\nAT&T’s satellite plans for now appear more tied into ongoing financial and spectrum investments in [AST SpaceMobile](https://www.sdxcentral.com/news/fcc-grants-ast-spacemobile-access-to-att-verizon-spectrum/) and a [recently formed joint venture](https://www.sdxcentral.com/news/att-t-mobile-us-verizon-eye-satellite-focused-spectrum-pooling-jv/) with fellow telecom giants Verizon and T-Mobile US.\n\n“The work that we're doing through combination of the JV and all the technical work we've been doing up to this point in time, for example, with one of the partners we're working with, AST Space Mobile, those are all going to come to fruition as we move into next year, and it's going to be a the product that we've been working on with the AST offering will be a very intuitive product that doesn't require the customer to do anything differently,” Stankey said. “They have their device and it behaves and operates just like it does today as they're moving around. But if they walk off the network, they're not going to walk off the network. We're going to provide them a seamless transition into coverage via satellite on a directed device basis, and so those are the corner cases I was alluding to that by the time we get into next year, we will have solved for that other 2% and we will be in the market doing what customers want, which is providing them the assurance that they can buy from one provider and always be on the internet.”", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/at-t-ceo-john-stankey-stays-strong-on-the-carriers-ai-support-stance", "canonical_source": "https://www.sdxcentral.com/news/att-ceo-john-stankey-stays-strong-on-the-carriers-ai-support-stance/", "published_at": "2026-07-22 19:50:49+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-07-22 20:10:13.938003+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-infrastructure", "ai-policy"], "entities": ["AT&T", "John Stankey", "Pascal Desroches", "600 MHz low-band spectrum"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/at-t-ceo-john-stankey-stays-strong-on-the-carriers-ai-support-stance", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/at-t-ceo-john-stankey-stays-strong-on-the-carriers-ai-support-stance.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/at-t-ceo-john-stankey-stays-strong-on-the-carriers-ai-support-stance.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/at-t-ceo-john-stankey-stays-strong-on-the-carriers-ai-support-stance.jsonld"}}