As a result of federal anti-trust regulations, cellular telephone provider Verizon Wireless will divest operations to AT&T in 38 Minnesota counties including Freeborn, Steele and Faribault counties.

AT&T announced the acquisition earlier this week.

It means that the Unicel office in Northbridge Mall in Albert Lea is slated to become an AT&T office next year. AT&T is the provider for the latest version Apple’s iPhone. The changeover could impact choices for smartphones across much of outstate Minnesota. Blackberry phones — iPhone’s main competitor — typically are not provider-specific.

Meanwhile, the Alltel stores across southern Minnesota remain on track to adopt the Verizon brand by September, according to Verizon spokeswoman Robin Nicol.

When Verizon purchased Alltel in January, it already had possession of Rural Cellular Corp. from a purchase in 2008. Rural Cellular Corp., which operates with the Unicel brand, in southern Minnesota is managed by a trust company during the regulatory process of Verizon’s Alltel purchase.

Nicol said federal regulators required Verizon to sell off Unicel service in areas where the company offered Alltel or Verizon brands and required it to sell off Alltel service in areas where there already was Verizon service.

“That was something we had anticipated back when we closed the Unicel purchase back in 2008,” Nicol said.

The divestiture is part of a nationwide, $2.35 billion agreement with Verizon. Under terms of the agreement, AT&T will acquire wireless properties, including licenses, network assets and 1.5 million current subscribers in 79 service areas, primarily in rural areas across 18 states.

AT&T spokesman Tom Hopkins said the approval process should be finished in the fourth quarter of this year. He said branding of AT&T to the acquired stores will take place a year after, likely before the end of 2010. Meanwhile, the company will upgrade the infrastructure of its acquired systems, he said.

“When you invest in the infrastructure, you improve services,” Hopkins said.

Verizon will sell its Alltel systems to AT&T in Kittson, Marshall, Pennington, Red Lake, Roseau, Beltrami, Clearwater, Lake of the Woods, Mahnomen and Norman counties.

It will sell Unicel systems to AT&T in Chippewa, Kandiyohi, McLeod, Meeker, Nicollet, Renville, Sibley, Lac qui Parle, Lincoln, Lyon, Redwood, Yellow Medicine, Brown, Cottonwood, Jackson, Martin, Murray, Nobles, Pipestone, Rock, Watonwan, Blue Earth, Faribault, Freeborn, Le Sueur, Rice, Steele and Waseca counties.

In Iowa, AT&T will acquire cellular services in Crawford, Harrison, Monona, Shelby, Cherokee, O’Brien, Lyon, Plymouth, Osceola and Sioux counties.

As part of the agreement conditions of the Alltel purchase in January, Verizon Wireless had to get rid of overlapping properties in 105 markets across 24 states, Nicol said.

The “My Circle” advertisements promote Alltel as being better than other services and poke fun at other companies including parent Verizon Wireless. She said the company deliberately kept up Alltel campaigns.

“We believe it’s best to not rebrand until customer has the full Verizon Wireless experience,” she said.

She said the company is rolling out the new brand in various places through this summer.

Alltel, in turn, had purchased Midwest Wireless in 2007.

The T-Mobile office on West Main Street in Albert Lea will be unaffected.