Verizon the biggest winner of the latest US millimeter-wave auction

An investment of $1.6 billion got Verizon almost five million licenses in the US auction of the Upper 37 GHz, 39 GHz, and 47 GHz bands that will be used for 5G.

You can see who got the most below. Apparently T-Mobile had been expected, at least by some analysts, to be the big winner, but it ended up a distant third. It’s also worth noting by how much Verizon won the auction, dropping almost half a billion bucks more than second placed AT&T. We’d be lying if we said we knew why there was so much variation in the price per license, but Columbia Capital must have really fancied those 52 it won.

“The successful conclusion of Auction 103—the largest amount of spectrum offered in an auction in U.S. history—is one more significant step the FCC has taken toward maintaining American leadership in 5G,” said FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. “A critical part of our 5G FAST plan is pushing more spectrum into the commercial marketplace. Last year, the FCC auctioned the 28 GHz and 24 GHz bands.

“All told, those two auctions and this one have made available almost five gigahertz of high-band spectrum for commercial use. To put that in perspective, that is more spectrum than is currently used for terrestrial mobile broadband by all wireless service providers in the United States combined. Auction 103 was a tremendous success, and we look forward to building on this positive result with the 3.5 GHz auction, which is scheduled to begin on June 25, and the C-band auction, which is scheduled to begin on December 8.”

Have you noticed how much Americans like the word ‘tremendous’ these days? One definition of it is ‘being such as may excite trembling or arouse dread, awe, or terror’. Fair enough. The mid bands on offer later this year are also for 5G. Those frequencies have better propagation characteristics than millimeter wave but there will be less of them, as is so often the way with radio spectra.