bigsnake49

If Dish is completely shutout of the Clearwire spectrum, they might or might not bid for T-Mobile. Their 40Mhz of spectrum is hardly enough to accomodate a fixed broadband network. It will be OK for a mobile network. Do they really want to pay a lot of money just to be the 4th wireless provider? I don't think so. Now if they get a substantial portion of Clearwire's spectrum, then going after T-Mobile makes sense because they can get them to host the Dish+Clearwire spectrum. Dish has a ticking clock to deploy their spectrum, selll it or lose it! Sprint will be going after T-Mobile because they think that the only way to compete against the big two is through scale. T-Mobile brings both spectrum and customers. The integration will be rather complicated, but well worth it. Now if they do merge, will they have to divest some spectrum. Possibly. Which band will they have to do that from?

51% from Sprint, 13% from the strategic investors and 9% from the hedge funds.

I see that Sprint still does not have 75% of the vote. By my calculation they have 73%.

If Charlie wants to play it straight up, then it's going to drag in the courts for ever. I'm pretty sure there will be a deal between Dish and Sprint over how to split Clearwire. If I was Sprint, I would just settle for getting my spectrum back with Dish assuming Clearwire's debt and network and EBS leases.

I had a dream that Sprint and T-Mobile merged and then bid for 600MHz spectrum.

Dish will make a bid for T-Mobile, but not without Clearwire spectrum. They need Clearwire's plentiful spectrum for their fixed broadband plans. The problem for Dish is that Sprint has their eyes on T-Mobile as well.

Are you sure you want to look under her hood ?

It was bound to happen. That requirement that they be given 3 directors on the board sounded kind of fishy.

At least in Florida Metro's site selection reflects that of Verizon who has a formidable 1900PCS spaced network in Florida. T-Mobile not so much.

T-Mobile better adopt Metro's sites in Florida. Wehere they cover, they cover better than T-Mobile.

Leap should let Sprint host their spectrum and become a Sprint MVNO.

They are doing the same thing in Florida. They put up approximately 600 new sites last year.

Only because they chose to deploy an n=3 Wimax reuse pattern. Which means they can be lazy about network optimization.

It really depends on whether Dish gets more than 25% of the shares and at least 3 directors. If they do and Crest gets $4.40, per share, then they have done well. Of course if Sprint has any side deals with shareholders so that Dish does not attain 25% or the three directors matter is tied up in court forever, then they are screwed. One thing is for sure. Nobody is going to be offering $7/share anytime soon.

It would be really nice to know the Clearwire's exact holdings for both the BRS and EBS spectrum by BTA.

Clearwire has BRS in 411 out of 493 BTAs. EBS licenses are licensed wierdly in that they are circles around a point of 25 miles radius. The point being the education institution or Catholic church/school.

We don't know the channel size, the number of people on the channel, the MIMO configuration at the basestation and the end user modem, the distance from the basestation, etc, etc. But I agree with you. Sprint can get somethings out of this if they are not too hung up on Charlie abrasive methods.

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/blog/1/entry-45-clearwire-releases-4th-quarter-2011-results-talks-about-td-lte/ About middle of the page: "To provide some analysis of the four points above, first and second, Clearwire holds an average of ~160 MHz of BRS/EBS spectrum bandwidth in the top 100 markets. However, as noted above, some of this spectrum (EBS) is leased from educational institutions, not licensed directly to Clearwire. Additionally, higher frequency spectrum is generally less valuable than is lower frequency spectrum. Otherwise, Clearwire's ~160 MHz of spectrum would be valued in the tens of billions of dollars." Believe me, I don't think that Clearwire is worth all the fuss. I would rather that Sprint merge with T-Mobile. That way they get both spectrum and customers.

Clearwire's (NASDAQ:CLWR) extensive 2.5 GHz spectrum holdings have long been considered the struggling operator's ace in the hole and a major selling point for Softbank's recent investment in Clearwire partner Sprint Nextel (NYSE:S). Two new analyst reports commissioned by Clearwire reinforce that line of thought, highlighting the operator's Band 41 spectrum and growing global interest in its TD-LTE deployment path. The reports lend credence to Clearwire's contention that its average of 160 MHz of spectrum in the top 100 markets puts it ahead of competitors in terms of bandwidth potential. The company has said it will start offering LTE with a 20 MHz channel and will use intra-band aggregation to combine that with another 20 MHz, eventually creating a 40 MHz pipe at every sector. Read more: Clearwire touts spectrum holdings, Softbank alignment - FierceBroadbandWireless http://www.fiercebroadbandwireless.com/story/clearwire-touts-spectrum-holdings-softbank-alignment/2012-10-28#ixzz2WDvMn9hk

And you think they can use all 160 or 180 MHz to offer mobile broadband every half a mile? Where the heck do you think they will find the demand to use all that spectrum? With a 4x4 MIMO arrangement feasible at 2.5Ghz. There is no possible mobile demand for that kind of bandwidth. Remember there's also the big 2 that serve oh, let's see >200M people. Even if all Sprint subscibers within a sector are streaming Youtube, you still can't fill up those pipes. Economies of scale can be gotten outta China Mobile that is going to be using 2.5GHZ TDD with their 700M customers, not Sprint's puny 56M. I really don't see a scenario that Sprint benefits from swallowing Clearwire whole. Too much debt, no customers... Now if they want to keep the BRS and sell the rest to Dish along with the Clearwire network and also get some hosting money, then we're talking. They get rid of debt, get some money for hosting and Bob's your uncle. They are the puppets of the cable cos because they need them to have 66 1/3% of the voting shares to change the bylaws. If you don't think that the cable cos are against selling to Dish, then there's nothing I can say to convince you otherwise. And it isn't about selling rural broadband. It's about seeling suburban broadband. You know, where most of us live.

Sprint will have 20x20 even without Clearwire's spectrum if they go after PCS H. The only way to have nationwide coverage with Clearwire's spectrum is to have cable strand mounted DAS. But then if you have that kind of density you don't need 180MHz worth of spectrum. No, Dish wants both fixed and mobile broadband. They want a network and they don't want to build their own. I also don't think they want to be the 5th wireless carrier. Clearwire they want the whole spectrum, but they also want somebody that has a nationwide network. Clearwire does not. Clearwire+ Sprint or Clearwire+T-Mobile do. Crest is only interested in maximizing their investment. I can't blame them.

Well, we know what Dish is going to be using Clearwire's spectrum for. I would like for Softbank/Sprint to detail their plans for the spectrum. And no, they don't need it all for mobile. So besides the cable cos not wanting the spectrum to fall in Dish's hands what is Sprint going to use it for? They will not use it for proving fixed broadband since that will take business away from the cable cos. At this time, it looks like Sprint/Softbank are operating as puppets of the cable cos. What are they getting in return? The only thing I can think of is very sweetened backhaul deals. Let's just say that Sprint/Softbank ultimately prevail. They add at least $4-5B worth of debt. Hotspot duty for the spectrum will not make up for the debt they are assuming. Remember the EBS leases are just that. Leases that expire. What happens if the educational institutions that have these leases decide to extract their pound of flesh from Sprint? Softbank/Sprint what's the endgame?

Yeah, they could, except it is the cable cos interest for Dish not to get Clearwire since they will be offering fixed broadband and OTT over Clearwire spectrum and therefore cutiing into cable cos business. I'm pretty sure that Intel has also been promised some business from Sprint for their fledging chipset business. So it is in the strategic investors best interest to vote with Sprint. Sprint was not really interested in Clearwire until Dish showed up. I mean they could have picked up a hell of a lot of shares in the open market at $.97/share last June, but they did not.

The remaining 32% of the Clearwire shareholders may sell their shares to Dish, but they will not get the representation they want. If they insist on giving them more than they deserve, then the matter will end up in court and will drag there.

Certainly seems that way!