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The Historic 700 MHz Extravaganza (Auction) is Finally OVER
The FCC concludes its highest revenue generating spectrum auction ever and releases the names of the winners.
This winter's Auction 73 extravaganza of 700 MHz spectrum has finally drawn to a close. But what is the ultimate result? Well, from a revenue standpoint the Federal Government seems happy as this auction netted $19.592 billion dollars for them. First some of the basics: The D block nobody bought. It appears that the millstone about its neck was the requirement to be available for public service needs. The FCC appears slated to re-auction that spectrum later. The A, B and C blocks however were hotly contested.
How about winners? In a statement Commissioner Martin said, "A bidder other than a nationwide incumbent won a license in every market." Okay so here is the full list. But AT&T appears to have still done very well in the B block, which was largely adjacent to its earlier acquisition of Aloha Partners spectrum, giving it 24 MHz in many parts of the country.
All told 99 non-nationwide carrier bidders won 754 licenses out of the 1090 sold. There were 428 Rural Service Licenses auctioned. And of this total 75 new players got 305 of them. This is very encouraging for potential rural deployments. There has been criticism of the lack of diversity from Commissioner Adelstein, based on a voluntary section of the applications where bidders could list themselves as minority or women owned businesses. No stated women owned businesses won licenses and only 7 of 1090 were won by minority-owned businesses.
Bidders have a four year build-out requirement and it will be interesting to see who is aggressive in deploying services. Also very interesting will be how quickly the WiMAX Forum will have gear to serve this spectrum range. Several vendors already make radios for this spectrum band and all of them are technically non-WiMAX as of yet, although some vendors say their designs fit WiMAX criteria.
I have to say I was ready for this one to be over.
Tim Sanders,
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