The FCC held a single round of bidding yesterday on 600 MHz spectrum licenses as part of the incentive auction proceedings. The government agency scheduled a pair of two-hour rounds each day through the end of the week, with bidders turning their attention to 100 megahertz of licensed spectrum up for bid with major carriers Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile likely to lead the charge.
Auction Proceeds (as of 5pm 8/16)
First Component Target: $15,896,290,987 $8,490,410,000 (actual)
Second Component Target: $88,379,558,704 $8,040,000,000 (estimated)
Reverse Auction
Current Round Bidding concluded Clearing Cost as of Stage 1 $86,422,558,704
Forward Auction
Current Round Round 2 Auction Proceeds as of Round 1 $8,490,410,000
“Unlike the reverse auction, in which there is a limited number of possible rounds, forward auction bidding rounds for a stage can continue without limit so long as demand outpaces supply for any product,” the FCC noted. “As such, we cannot predict when the forward auction will conclude.”
The FCC is offering 10 blocks of spectrum that will be split into 428 partial economic area coverage blocks, covering a total of 4,030 licenses.
Throughout the forward auction, the public will be able to obtain information about the results of bidding on the Public Reporting System (PRS). You can view the upcoming schedule of bidding rounds on the Dashboard of the PRS as well as track progress toward meeting the two prongs of the final stage rule that determines whether the auction will close at the current clearing target.
“The government agency may need to conduct further reverse auction stages should forward auction bidding not meet the current $86 billion clearing target,” said FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler. “The auction is a market-based mechanism for matching supply with demand,” Wheeler said. “Until the forward bidding concludes, we will not know whether the demand meets the large supply offered by broadcasters. Depending upon that response, it’s possible that we would need to move to additional stages to find the level where demand meets supply. The Commission intentionally designed the auction to account for the possibility that supply and demand might not match at the initial clearing target. It’s something we planned for, and we’re fully prepared to implement if the need arises.”
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