AT&T announced today the intended acquisition of rival and #4 US wireless carrier, T-Mobile.

The boards of AT&T Inc. and Deutsche Telekom AG, owner of T-Mobile USA, came into an agreement that allows AT&T to acquire T-Mobile, in exchange for cash and stock worth approximately $39 billion.  Also, Deutsche Telekom AG will receive an 8% ownership share in the combined business.

No word on how long such an acquisition would take to be approved and finalized.  It is unclear at this time if the federal government will have issue with any of AT&T’s offer.

The full press release can be found here.

Here’s what we know:

LTE network launches December 5th.
38 Markets at launch, 60+ airports.
5-12 Mbps download, 2-5 Mbps upload, claiming up to 10 times faster than 3G.
Two USB devices available at launch, $99.99 each after $50 rebate.
5GB plan for $50, 10GB plan for $80, $10/GB overage standard on both plans, no usage limit, no speed throttler
Expected to expand to full coverage by or in 2013.

Here’s what we don’t know:

When an LTE phone will launch.

Verizon will announce it’s first LTE-capable phones at CES (Consumer Electronics Show) in January.  In the Q&A they clarified that we would be seeing an LTE smartphone “by” mid-2011, but not necessarily “in” mid-2011.

We’ll update you with more as or if it comes.