What should Apple buy with their billions? A carrier. 
As far as I’m concerned there is only one thing that could be totally game-changing for Apple’s main business, iOS devices, at this point: total freedom from the carriers. The only way to ensure this is for Apple to create its own carrier. A carrier that serves iOS devices with an always-on data connection that allows them to take advantage of their features in a way that the current carrier system never could.
Interesting POV, though A) A little oversimplified, and B) I would guess Google would make that jump before Apple would. That being said I’ve often wondered if one were interested in creating a new (read: “technologically modern”) carrier, whether the economics would be better to buy a current carrier and strip down the parts they don’t need, or to build their own from the ground up sans all the legacy tech that carriers inevitably have to support.
Oh and serious point - wouldn’t they only need to buy a nice, big chunk of one on the public markets to get the influence they need and the deals done well?
But even then, it’d be just one carrier, and the complications in continuing deals with the other ones wouldn’t only not go away, they’d presumably get WORSE.
