LAS VEGAS -- Well, that was a surreal series of events.
I was on my way to AT&T's developer party, held as a cap off to itsdeveloper conference held in conjunction to the Consumer ElectronicsShow, when I ran into a familiar face at the Palms taxi line: T-Mobile CEO John Legere.
Legere, wearing a leather jacket over his trademark pink T-MobileT-shirt, was accompanied by an entourage, including Chief FinancialOfficer Braxton Carter.
Their goal: Crash AT&T's party and watch Macklemore and Ryan Lewis perform.
After getting in without any problems, Legere and I stopped to take asnapshot and I tweeted it out.
Ran into @JohnLegere at the AT&T party. Yep, he crashed it. And still wearing the pink t-mo shirt. #CES2014 pic.twitter.com/gy9vGTJUEW
— Roger Cheng (@RogerWCheng) January 7, 2014About 15 minutes later, several security guards surrounded Legere and escortedhim out of the venue.
Oh wow, security just escorted @JohnLegere out of the party. AT&T is not happy with my tweet. #ces2014
— Roger Cheng (@RogerWCheng) January 7, 2014To say that this is competition getting extremely fierce would be anunderstatement. Around that time, AT&T's own mobility CEO, Ralph de la Vega, announced that his company had won the rights to provide LTE connection to Audi, snatching away a cellular contract previously struck with T-Mobile.
While Legere claimed he was attending for the music, it's more likelyhe was looking for the kind of outcome where he was going to be kicked out. AT&T, alerted tohis presence at the party, had him removed.
He undoubtedly would have tweeted about it, and indeed did after the incident. But healso had the luck of meeting this reporter, who inadvertently helped expedite the process.
It's the latest stunt by Legere, who has been prone to bold words andaction when it comes to needling his competitors -- particularly AT&T.
T-Mobile is expected to make more noise on Wednesday when it holds itspress conference to announce "Uncarrier 4.0." Legere teased it would give T-Mobile the edge to "crush thecompetition," and said it would go further than AT&T's offer of a $200break to T-Mobile customers switching over. He declined to spill thebeans at the party.
If nothing else, Legere has amped up the expectations for Wednesday'spress conference.
So was it shrewd marketing or just a genuine love of the artist? Onecan't really say for sure.
One thing is certain: It made for a memorable night. And all thisbefore Macklemore got on stage.
Legere, however, did actually get in through legitimate means. Legereand his crew got their passes from Macklemore's agent.
Just another night at CES, I guess.