US mobile operator T-Mobile USA has called on the FCC to block two proposed acquisitions of spectrum by Verizon Wireless. T-Mobile said in its filing yesterday the regulator should reject the deals in order “to prevent an excessive concentration of…
US mobile operator T-Mobile USA has called on the FCC to block two proposed acquisitions of spectrum by Verizon Wireless.
T-Mobile said in its filing yesterday the regulator should reject the deals in order “to prevent an excessive concentration of mobile service spectrum holdings that is contrary to the public interest”.
In December 2011, Verizon Wireless announced two acquisitions of Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum worth a total of almost US$4bn in value.
The first involved the US$3.6bn purchase of 122 AWS licences from SpectrumCo, a JV made up of three major US cablecos: Bright House Networks, Comcast and Time Warner Cable.
The second was the US$315m acquisition of 20MHz of AWS spectrum from Cox Communications, another cableco.
In its filing, T-Mobile argued that the acquired spectrum would be unlikely to provide near-term benefits to Verizon Wireless customers.
The operator said: “Rather, the principal impact of the acquisition would be to foreclose the possibility that this spectrum could be acquired by smaller competitors – such as T-Mobile – who would use it more quickly, more intensively and more efficiently than Verizon Wireless.”
T-Mobile also noted that the deals were accompanied by a set of marketing and joint venture agreements. It claimed that these “require further investigation to determine whether any illicit market divisions have been negotiated”.
The FCC’s deadline for petitions to deny was yesterday.
In separate filings, mobile operator MetroPCS Communications made a petition to the FCC deny the spectrum acquisitions, while Hawaiian Telcom Communications petitioned the FCC to deny or condition the deals.
Other parties now have until 2 March to oppose these petitions.
Verizon Wireless was not immediately available for comment.
When the US$3.6bn acquisition from SpectrumCo was first announced, the president and CEO of Verizon Wireless, Dan Mead, said that buying the AWS spectrum “solidifies our network leadership into the future, and will enable us to bring even better 4G LTE products and services to our customers”.
