Tag archive: spectrum

Number-three mobile operator Sprint has filed separate lawsuits against Time Warner, Comcast, Cox Communications, and Cable One, alleging the companies violate a dozen Sprint patents related to digital phone technology. The patents in the suits date back to the 1990s, and some of them are the same patents that Sprint used back in 2007 to extract an $80 million settlement from Vonage over its VoIP operations. In all the complaints, Sprint says… Read More

Verizon Wireless has purchased 122 spectrum licenses from a number of cable companies as it aims to bolster and expand its 4G LTE network, the company announced today. The licenses come from Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks, and were purchased for $3.6 billion in total. The purchase is actually for shares of the company SpectrumCo, of which the cable giants each own a chunk. Comcast is selling its 63.6 percent share for $2.3… Read More

The ink is barely dry on AT&T's $39 billion acquisition plan for T-Mobile, but T-Mobile customers are already clamoring for information on what's going to happen with their service and their phones. Details are still emerging, but one thing seems clear: phones that tap into T-Mobile's 3G services will eventually need to be replaced, and AT&T worked the cost of replacing all those handsets into the price of the… Read More

Part of the United States' purpose in transitioning to digital television was to free up the spectrum used by over-the-air analog television broadcasts for use by cool new mobile broadband technologies—and although Clearwire is earnestly building out WiMax and LTE has yet to appear in the U.S. market, already mobile operators and the FCC itself are warning of a looming “spectrum crisis” wherein there won't be enough… Read More

The Federal Communications Commission has voted to approve a plan (PDF) that will allow wireless devices to operate in unused “whitespaces” in the television broadcast spectrum. The whitespace plan has been backed by technology companies like Google and Microsoft as a means to enable new capabilities in wireless devices like mobile phones, media players, and cameras; however, it has been opposed by traditional broadcasters and… Read More

Earlier this week, Google filed a request with the Federal Communications Commission asking that the regulatory body monitor Verizon Wireless's use of 700 MHz spectrum licenses it acquired in the recent spectrum auction to ensure Verizon adheres to openness requirements set out by the FCC. Basically, Google wants to make sure access to Verizon's 700 MHz spectrum really will be open to any device and any application, not just… Read More

Following its failed bids for licenses in the recently-closed FCC 700MHz wireless spectrum auction (but an optimistic attitude toward the loss), Google has moved on to cracking open what it sees as the next frontier in wireless connectivity: white space. On Monday, the company released a letter to the FCC encouraging it to open up the unused “white space” between TV channels for private use. “The vast majority of viable… Read More

Verizon and AT&T were the big winners in the FCC's much-watched 700 MHz wireless spectrum auction (PDF), bidding more than $16 billion to control vast swathes of the soon-to-be-available spectrum that may be the United States best hope for nationwide wireless broadband services. The auction comprised a total of 1,099 licenses, including both nationwide blocks and many regional licenses. Verizon Wireless won the largest nationwide C… Read More

The Federal Communications Commission recently put part of the wireless spectrum up for auction, thinking it would bring in $10-15 billion.   Wrong.   Sofar the bids have totalled a staggering $18.9 billion, according to Vnunet, and according to one company, ABI Research,the demand is so high that "not even the pending recession impacts the bidding process."   What makes it so important? Basically, the whole wireless… Read More

From all the discussion about it, you’d be forgiven for thinking it had already happened. But actually today is when the FCC begins its auction of the remaining wireless spectrum, and it hassugar plum visions of raising around $10 billion, Reuters reports.   Although the expected big boys – AT&T andVerizon Wireless – will be among the bidders, they won’t have the field to themselves. They’ll be joined by a… Read More

Billionaire entrepreneur and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen has applied to bid in the FCC's upcoming 700 MHz spectrum auction, going up against major telecommunications providers as well as Internet giant Google. Allen's application comes via his investment company Vulcan Capital, which has been behind everything from genetics research to the Portland Trailblazers to Seattle's Experience Music Project. Vulcan's… Read More

It’s called the digital dividend, the part of the radio spectrum that will be freed up over the next few years as the UK moves from analogue to digital signals for television and radio.  What the dividend is, really, is that amount that will be generated when government watchdog Ofcom auctions off that spectrum.   According to a story onZDNet, there’s speculation that Google might well put in a bid when the auctions happen… Read More

British government communications watchdog Ofcom has announced that it will begin its fifth radio spectrum auction next spring.   The L-Band, as its known,covers 1452-1492 MHz, should prove popular, since it’s best suit to multimedia services, including broadband wireless access and mobile television.   The auction comes as part of a widerinitiative.   “The release of the spectrum in the 1452-1492MHz band is part of a… Read More

In recent months, Internet giant Google has repeatedly indicated its interest in the upcoming FCC auction for spectrum in the 700 MHz range, first saying it would guarantee a minimum bid of $4.6 billion if certain principles of “openness” were imposed on the spectrum, then—when the FCC only made a partial commitment to openness on the “C block” portion of the auction—indicating it might bid on the spectrum… Read More

Back in July, Internet giant Google raised eyebrows by saying it would guarantee a bid of $4.6 billion in the FCC's upcoming 700MHz wireless spectrum auction if the regulatory agency would adopt four “openness principles” Google felt were critical to the development of wireless applications and competition. Although FCC didn't adopt Google's principles—and plans to enforce less-expansive openness polices… Read More