Yikes. Clearwire now has $1.1 billion for WiMax

Clearwire Corporation, the Kirkland, Wash. company that is building out a WiMax network that offers stronger, wider broadband wireless access, today announced yesterday it has gotten additional equity investment of $100 million, and debt financing of $125 million.

The investment comes from Silicon Valley’s chip giant, Intel Capital, which is making a bold bet on the WiMax technology, and Motorola Ventures

This brings the Clearwire’s total new funding since August to more than $1.1 billion, excluding proceeds from the sale of NextNet Wireless to Motorola. The purchase price for NextNet Wireless was not disclosed.

In connection with the transactions, Clearwire also announced the appointment of Arvind Sodhani, president of Intel Capital, and David Perlmutter, senior vice president and general manager of the Intel Mobility Group, to its board of directors.

This is an amazing amount of money for a company that is still losing money, and makes us wonder whether it really hopes to make money one day, or whether this has just become an off-book vehicle for Intel and Motorola to juice WiMax’s adoption and make money by selling chips and other equipment from their core operations.

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