Verizon in NextWave airwaves talks
According to
Reuters, Verizon Wireless is in talks to purchase wireless airwaves rights from NextWave. The deal is valued at $3 billion for around 20 NextWave licenses. Details are scarce, and the story is sourced by an anonymous contact "close to the situation", but
MobileTracker will keep you posted.
Update: The Wall Street Journal offers more [Sub. Req.] on this rumor. Included is a great background on the NextWave saga:
bq. NextWave's travails have lasted nearly a decade. The company won roughly $5 billion in radio-wave spectrum licenses in 1996, but filed for bankruptcy protection two years later. The Federal Communications Commission eventually took possession of the licenses and re-auctioned them. But after wireless carriers bid again on the licenses, led by Verizon Wireless, the Supreme Court ruled that the FCC improperly had reclaimed the licenses, putting them back in NextWave's possession.
