The FCC recently completed an auction of AWS-3 spectrum raising almost $45 billion in bids in the process. The amount raised was quite a bit more than the FCC’s last big spectrum auction held in 2008 when they raised $19.1 billion selling 700MHz spectrum. The big player in this round turned out to be AT&T which bid nearly $18.2 billion for 251 licenses. The biggest chunk of those were in the New York City metro area. AT&T says the new spectrum helps them cover 96 percent of the U.S. population with AWS-3 spectrum.
In a bit of surprise, the second largest bidder was DISH which grabbed $13.3 billion worth of spectrum. DISH has been hoping to start up a terrestrial LTE network to augment their satellite offerings, so this latest purchase may help them with that goal. The other large bidders included Verizon and T-Mobile who also hope to strengthen their networks in anticipation of expanding their advanced network offerings in the coming years. Sprint did not participate in this auction as they prepare to invest in 600MHz spectrum in an auction scheduled for next year.
source: The Verge
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