In a bold and surprising move this morning, Dish Network made a $25.5 billion offer to purchase Sprint — a takeover that would satisfy the satellite TV company’s wireless ambitions, while also squashing takeover efforts by Japan’s Softbank.

Dish’s offer is 13 percent more than the $20.1 billion Softbank offered for a 70 percent share of Sprint last year. The big difference: Dish’s deal would be a complete takeover, while Softbank’s would leave Sprint as a separate public company, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The move follows an informal bid by Dish for Clearwire earlier this year. Sprint offered to buy out Clearwire for $2.2 billion back in December, but Dish jumped in with its own $5.5 billion offer. It seemed like Clearwire shareholders were leaning towards Dish’s higher offer, but then Clearwire ended up taking $80 million from Sprint to stay afloat, which indicated that they were back to considering  Sprint’s deal.

By buying Sprint, Dish would have access to both Sprint and Clearwire’s precious wireless spectrum, and it would have the country’s third-largest cellular network. Dish already has more than $9 billion worth of wireless spectrum, and it won approval from regulators last December to use it. But building a network of its own would take forever and likely cost more than what it’s offering for Sprint.

The deal would enable Dish to offer a similar variety of services as competing cables companies: TV, home phone, and Internet service. Charles Ergen, Dish’s chairman, says customers would be able to get Internet access from Sprint’s network via antennas on their roof.

If Dish successfully kills Softbank’s deal with Sprint, Ergen says that it would pay off the $600 million breakup fee owed to the Japanese company.

The real question for Sprint’s shareholders: Are they willing to go with a suitor unproven in the wireless industry? Dish may have a bunch of useful spectrum, but it doesn’t yet have any experience in the mobile world. Softbank, on the other hand, has 32 million mobile subscribers in Japan.

Illustration: Tom Cheredar/VentureBeat

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Verizon no longer wants its wireless destiny tied to the European carrier Vodafone.

Verizon is reportedly working to take full ownership over Verizon Wireless, its joint venture with Vodafone, reports Bloomberg. Among the potential options, Verizon is apparently considering a buyout of Vodafone’s 45 percent stake (worth around $115 billion, according to analyst estimates) or a massive merger.

Judging from what Bloomberg is hearing, it doesn’t sound like the merger is very likely. Two sources say the companies discussed a potential union in December, but they ended up disagreeing on headquarters location and leadership structure. A merger would also be one of the biggest corporate takeovers ever, considering Verizon’s $130 billion market cap and Vodafone’s $120 billion.

In the end, it’s much simpler for Verizon to pay.

And with Verizon Wireless being its most profitable division, it makes sense for Verizon to want full control. It could lead to more creative subscription plans, new types of advertising, or perhaps even business ideas we haven’t even considered.

At its CES booth in January, Verizon focused heavily on the many ways it could use its wireless network outside of phones. For example, it could power video headsets for firefighters, which would help them to pull up building schematics on the fly, or it could connect solar recycling bin to alert operators when it’s full.

Vodafone’s chief executive Vittorio Colao has also been actively trying to sell off its stakes in joint operations, Bloomberg points out, so he would likely welcome Verizon’s buyout offer.

Verizon hasn’t been shy about wanting to take over its wireless division over the past few years. Verizon Wireless was born from a joint venture between Bell Atlantic (which would later become Verizon) and Vodafone in 1999. Given just how much the mobile landscape has changed since then, it simply makes sense for Verizon to want to break things off.

Photo: Eric Hauser /Flickr

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Clearwire’s fate is beginning to resemble a daytime soap opera.

The troubled company has grabbed $80 million in financing from Sprint –  its longtime partner and majority stakeholder — potentially killing Dish’s buyout offer, reports Reuters.

Sprint offered to buy out Clearwire for $2.2 billion back in December, but Dish shot back with its own $5.5 billion offer earlier this year. Clearwire shareholders weren’t pleased with Sprint’s low offer, and it seemed like they were leaning toward accepting Dish’s — until today.

As part of its deal, Sprint offered Clearwire $800 million to stay afloat until everything was finalized. But Clearwire said it wouldn’t use any of Sprint’s financing as long as it was still considering Dish’s offer. By accepting Sprint’s $80 million, it seems like Clearwire has made up its mind to forgo Dish’s higher offer. Clearwire isn’t commenting on the status of its negotiations yet.

Why the battle for a failed wireless provider? As with most issues in the wireless world, it’s all about spectrum. Sprint desperately needs more spectrum to build out its LTE network in the U.S., and Dish is also gearing up to provide its own LTE service according to a recent regulatory filing.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

What comes after LTE? Europe’s digital chief, Neelie Kroes, is determined to find out.

Aiming to make Europe a wireless leader once again, Kroes (above, scoping out a connected car) announced today at Mobile World Congress that she’s pouring €50 million (around $65.3 million) into the development of next-generation 5G networks, GigaOm reports. She hopes for “delivery” of 5G by 2020 — but that will likely be difficult since it EU countries will have to figure out wireless spectrum issues.

“Europe used to lead the world on wireless… European 5G is an unmissable opportunity to recapture the global technological lead,” Kroes said today.

Kroes is hoping to spur on research for wireless technology that’s that faster, more power efficient, and more efficient with spectrum than 4G LTE. LTE manufacturers and chip makers have made huge strides when it comes to battery consumption, but it remains the single biggest problem for most LTE devices. If we are to rely on our smartphones more in the future, we need them to last more than a work day.

The 5G investment is part of a public and private partnership across the European mobile industry. Major EU carriers like Telefonica, Deutsche Telecom, France Telecom are also involved (no surprise there). The biggest problem for the continent is the harmonization of wireless spectrum (basically, agreeing on the same spectrum to make wireless deployments and roaming simpler). Kroes likens Europe’s current spectrum map to “a bowl of spaghetti.”

Photo: Campus Party Europa/Flickr

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

FreedomPop’s dream of offering free wireless broadband to consumers has been a hit with its investors.

Today the company announced that it has raised an addition $4.3 million for its first round from existing investors DCM and Mangrove Capital, on top of the the $7.5 million it raised last year. Additionally, the company is making its social broadband platform even more useful by letting you use social networks to request more bandwidth from friends.

Los Angeles-based FreedomPop made headlines last year with its seemingly impossible goal: Offering wireless devices that offer a significant chunk of bandwidth for free, with the ability to earn even more free bandwidth by bringing on friends. So far the company has released a 4G wireless sleeve for the iPod Touch, and a USB stick, and a wireless hotspot. All of its devices run on ClearWire’s 4G WiMax network, though the company says its future devices will on run Sprint’s LTE 4G network.

Now when you invite a friend to FreedomPop, you’ll get an additional 50 megabytes of monthly bandwidth, instead of just 10 MB.

Stephen Sokols, FreedomPop’s chief executive, said that the company “exceeded investor expectations,” in an interview with VentureBeat. While the company will eventually raise a much larger second round, the additional internal funding is a way to reward its existing investors. Sokols said that all of FreedomPop’s growth has been completely organic, so it hasn’t had to waste much money with big marketing efforts.

FreedomPop has given away nearly 2 terabytes of free bandwidth since its launch, Sokols said. Subscribers are also inviting 15 friends on average to the service.

The company’s recently announced home wireless router is going to officially launch within three to four weeks, Sokols said, while the iPhone 4 case is currently pending FCC approval. He said that FreedomPop will eventually offer an iPhone 5 case, though details about that device are still up in the air.

T-Mobile just unleashed a flurry of news at CES: The company’s popular Unlimited Nationwide 4G Data plan is going contract free tomorrow, it’s launching a new program to bring 4G wireless to laptops and tablets, and it’s also the first U.S. carrier to launch HD Voice for clear calls.

Oh, and it has also partnered with Major League Baseball to power a new on-field communication system. Whew.

First launched last September, T-Mobile says its Unlimited Nationwide 4G data plan has been a smashing success, attracting nearly 46 percent of new subscribers last month. Starting tomorrow, T-Mobile is going to make the plan even more appealing by offering it for $70 a month with no contract.

Such a move could help T-Mobile stand apart from AT&T and Verizon Wireless, which have both moved away from unlimited plans. But it’s hard to say if it will be enough to stem T-Mobile’s subscriber bleed. T-Mobile remains the only U.S. carrier without the iPhone, which has led to some dismal earnings for the last several quarters.

T-Mobile is also launching “4G Connect,” an effort to equip more laptops and tablets with 4G access. The program will kick off on a few Windows 8 laptops and Ultrabooks, including the Dell Inspiron 14z and HP Pavilion dm1. The amount of free data on every device will vary, but T-Mobile says you’ll be able ot get up to 200 megabytes of free monthly 4G service when you pick up on of the 4G Connect computers. For additional data, you can choose from any of the carrier’s monthly plans.

HD Voice, which offers a significant improvement on call quality, has been flipped on for T-Mobile’s network today, the carrier announced. You’ll need a compatible 4G smartphone to take advantage of HD Voice, and it’ll only work with other HD Voice capable T-Mobile subscribers for now. But it’s still a major get for T-Mobile. For all of its competitors LTE network advancements, call quality hasn’t improved much.

T-Mobile also said that it has launched support for 1900 megahertz spectrum in Denver, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Virginia Beach, which will allow unlocked iPhone owners to utilize the full speed of its network. The carrier now supports the iPhone-ready spectrum in 46 metro areas.

When it comes to its own LTE network, T-Mobile plans to kick off its coverage with Las Vegas in the next few weeks, the Verge reports. The carrier plans to cover more than 100 million people with its LTE network by the middle of the year.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Apparently, we love Wi-Fi.

Total cumulative global Wi-Fi-enabled device shipments reached five billion in 2012, according to ABI Research. And the pace of innovation isn’t slowing, with new Wi-Fi protocols rolling out in 2013 and close to 20 billion WiFi-enabled devices predicted to be in the market by 2017.

Naturally, we’re familiar with Wi-Fi in our laptops and smartphones. But the next level of Wi-Fi penetration, the firm says, is likely to be in home automation and smart, connected cars, as manufacturers continue to connect formerly isolated devices, equipment, and other things.

What’s up next? More speed, according to ABI’s Peter Cooney:

“Wi-Fi continues to develop as a technology in many ways,” Cooney said, adding that “the 802.11n protocol is now well established and has pushed the envelope increasing data rates, expanding Wi-Fi into the less crowded 5GHz space.”

The newest Wi-Fi protocols will vastly improve wireless data transfer speeds, with 802.11ac bringing gigabit-Ethernet style speeds and 802.11ad blazing up to a theoretical maximum speed of seven gigabits per second. 802.11b, by contrast, can only manage 11 megabits per second.

Of course, it’s not just Wi-Fi that is connecting our stereos, lights, cars, and smartphones. It’s also the full spectrum of communication technologies such as Bluetooth, UWB, NFC, and Zigbee. In fact, despite the fact that Wi-Fi is pervasive and powerful, it may be one of the least popular wireless communication protocols, as ABI is also predicting that in 2013 all of these technologies (combined with Wi-Fi) will result in more than five billion shipments of wireless connectivity chips in 2013 alone.

Which means that our devices will be smart and connected, even if we’re frying each other with all those radio waves.

photo credit: Palagret via photopin cc

Most of those five billion chips won’t be in phones, as tablets, sensors, cameras, lightbulbs, refrigerators, and more increasingly get connected to the Internet.

I talked to Peter Cooney, a wireless analyst with ABI, just before the the research company’s London offices closed for the Christmas long weekend.

“While the base market is primarily things that we know like smartphones and tablets, the growth is for the internet of things … those devices are growing very quickly,” Cooney said.

Of course, a lot of chips are being made for and shipped in more standard devices, Cooney added: smartphones, tablets, laptops, and netbooks. Even old-school feature phones are incorporating Bluetooth in addition to the standard cellular connectivity radios.

And one technology that we’re not seeing much of this side of the Atlantic is poised for a breakout: NFC. In fact, it’s more than poised, according to Cooney.

“NFC has gone from two million devices in 2010 to 100 million in 2012,” he said. “Android is really driving that growth, but NFC is coming of age … and integration into smartphones is driving growth in other areas.”

In fact, many “other” areas — as in not phones, not tablets, not laptops — are also getting a lot of wireless innovation.

“Really, any kind of consumer device is getting wireless chips,” Cooney told me this morning.

That’s something we’ve seen a lot of this year: sensors and connected switches for windows and doors, lights, heating, and more. SmartThings wants to help you control the real world, as does ReelyActive. And while NFC has been the next great thing for some time, we’re seeing a ton of innovation in the home automation space using multiple wireless protocols.

One of the big trends ABI is seeing is integration — like what Apple did in the iPhone 5 by marrying the LTE and global 4G chips into one.

“They’re essentially integrating to reduce cost and size,” Cooley said. Broadcom, one of the leading suppliers in the “combo IC” (integrated chip) market, will continue to dominate, ABI said.

Even old-fashioned technologies are showing new tricks: Bluetooth smart is coming out, and faster Wi-fi (WiGig) is on the horizon. It all ads up to a lot of wireless devices.

“In 2013 cumulative shipments of Bluetooth-enabled devices will surpass 10 billion and Wi-Fi enabled devices will surpass 10 billion cumulative shipments in 2015,” Cooney said in a statement.

The internet of things, indeed.

photo credit: Gramophone Maryland via photopin cc, BrickArt!san via photopin cc

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Cisco Systems announced on its blog today that it will acquire Denver-based BroadHop for an undisclosed sum. The technology will be used to shape mobile data traffic and will be folded into Cisco’s service provider networking group.

According to Cisco’s VP of Corporate Business Development, Hilton Romanski, global IP traffic is projected to increase threefold in the next five years. For this reason, the networking giant had its eye on BroadHop, a policy control and service management technology for carrier networks that has been around since 2003. BroadHop is deployed by more than 70 wireline and mobile carriers around the world.

BroadHop has an open policy platform, which is designed to make it easier for service providers to control and monetize any service, regardless of whether the network has new or legacy components. In a nutshell, the technology allows a carrier to develop service tiers based on bandwidth or application.

According to Romanski, the technology will benefit Cisco’s service providers, as users will be incentivized to purchase ”customized premium service packages,” such as on-demand streaming.

The BroadHop team will report to Shailesh Shukla, vice president and general manager of Cisco’s software and applications group.

The networking giant acquired three companies last month — most recently, Cariden for $141 million in cash. In an interview with VentureBeat, Cisco’s cloud computing CTO Lew Tucker stressed that the company is always on the look-out for potential acquisition opportunities to bring innovation to its suite of products.

However, GigaOm’s Kevin Fitchard pointed out, Cisco is not the first to jump on board the policy bandwagon. Aging giant Citrix whisked away Bytemobile earlier this year.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

In a battle between two troubled phone manufacturers, Nokia is seeking to block the sales of some of Research in Motion’s BlackBerry phones, following RIM’s loss in a patent dispute between the two.

Nokia asked a San Jose court yesterday to enforce the BlackBerry ban, reports ComputerWorld, until the two companies can agree on new royalty rates for RIM to use Nokia’s wireless LAN (WLAN) technology (more popularly known as Wi-Fi).

RIM initially licensed wireless patents from Nokia in a 2003 agreement, but Nokia claims the WLAN patents at issue weren’t included in that deal. Now that almost every BlackBerry phone includes Wi-Fi functionality, blocking a sales block could be a death knell for the already troubled company.

Neither RIM or Nokia are commenting on the case at the moment.

Among the patents at issue are U.S. patent 5,479,476, which deals with “adjustable operating characteristics” for phones; 6,427,078, which covers a portable workstation; and 6,049,796, which concerns real-time search on a personal digital assistant. Three other patents deal with more general features, including a cellphone interface, call rejection, and alerts while the phone is in silent.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Wireless networking chips are a mature market, dominated by companies like Broadcom and Qualcomm. But Israeli startup Celeno Communications has raised $24 million to start the war for wireless networking chips anew.

Celeno believes it has a wedge into the market because it can offer faster WiFi and consumers are downloading more and more video for multiple screens in their homes using wireless networks. The funding suggests that the company is making good progress toward that goal, the company said. Celeno’s technology promises to double the rate of data flow in a wireless network and increase its range ten-fold compared to standard WiFi networks. That’s important because just about every consumer is sick and tired of lousy wireless Internet access.

Ra’anana, Israel-based Celeno makes high-performance WiFi chips and software for high-definition multimedia and data networking applications. In a fifth round of funding, the company has tapped investors including Cisco, Liberty Global, Greylock Partners, and Pitango Venture Capital. To date, it has raised $68 million, making it one of the rare VC-backed semiconductor companies and one of the biggest bets on wireless networking technology.

Celeno’s chips are already in use at 75 service providers around the world, including Deutsche Telekom, Liberty Global, UPC, Bouygues Telecom, and China Telecom. The company says it can provide “zero packet loss,” which means there will be no annoying artifacts, jerky motion, or snow in a video transferred over a network with Celeno’s chips.

“The new funding comes at an exciting time in our industry as we move toward 802.11ac, the standard set to drive faster WiFi in the home,” said Gilad Rozen, CEO of Celeno. “Celeno, with its superior video-grade WiFi OptimizAir technology, is ideally positioned to capitalize on the increasing requirement by carriers seeking to offer consumers the high-quality video experience they demand on multiple screens throughout the home.”

Celeno’s OptimizAir technology optimizes wireless signals so that it can stream eight 1080p HD video streams over standard WiFi networks, including 802.11a, 802.11n, and 802.11ac protocols. It uses advanced mathematical techniques such as channel-aware scheduling, rate selection, antenna selection and power adaptation for reliable throughput, extended range, and low packet error rate. That basically means it uses known techniques to efficiently manipulate wireless signals to eliminate noise and improve the flow of data. It has smarter antennae and the ability to switch channels to get around interference.

It works with a variety of networking hubs and routers and enables one device to distribute video throughout the home wirelessly to set-top boxes, tablet computers, wireless TVs, digital video recorders, media streamers, laptops, and other devices.

Celeno was founded in 2005 and has 70 employees. Rozen has a lot of experience in digital communications technology and was previously senior vice president at Actelis Networks. He’s also a veteran of the elite research and development unit of the Israeli Defense Forces.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

There’s no end in sight for T-Mobile’s subscriber drain. After losing 510,000 contracted subscribers in the first quarter of 2012, T-Mobile announced this morning that it has lost 557,000 in its second quarter.

The carrier reported profits of $207 million (down from $212 million last year) on $4.9 billion in revenue (down 3.3 percent from last year). Still, T-Mobile reports that its profitability has improved, with EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) up 18.6 percent from last year.

T-Mobile added 227,000 prepaid subscribers — likely due to its low-cost phones and prepaid plans. But it’s worth noting that prepaid customers are far less valuable to carriers, since they’re not tied to contracts. Average revenue per user fell 4.3 percent across prepaid and contract customers (mostly due to the rise of prepaid users).

The carrier is pushing forward with its $4 billion plan to build out a LTE 4G network next year, but it’s going to have to work doubletime to attract subscribers after losing them in droves. T-Mobile is currently the only major U.S. carrier not offering the iPhone, but that could change next year once it rolls out LTE. I find it hard to imagine that T-Mobile customers will be patient enough to wait for that though.

Even T-Mobile’s former CEO Philipp Hum didn’t have enough faith in the carrier to stick around (he’s now heading up Vodafone’s European operations). T-Mobile COO Jim Allings is currently serving as interim CEO, but the company will need to find some strong leadership soon if it’s to survive the next few years.

Since this time last year, T-Mobile’s contracted subscriber numbers fell 9 percent from 23.4 million to 21.3 million, while prepaid customers jumped 22 percent to 5.3 million. Overall, T-Mobile had 33.2 million customers at the end of the quarter, down slightly from the 33.4 million customers last year.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Verizon Wireless posted encouraging second quarter numbers, bolstered by increased revenue from smartphone sales and the shift from copper to fiber optics’ FiOS for wireline and Internet customers. The No. 1 U.S. mobile carrier announced Thursday a $1.83 billion quarterly profit on $28.552 billion in revenue.

The company, a joint effort with Vodafone Group, announced wireless revenue rose 7.3 percent to $15.8 billion, compared to a year ago. Meanwhile, wireline second-quarter revenue fell 3.1 percent to $9.9 billion. Smartphones now comprise 50 percent of Verizon’s wireless sales, up from 47 percent in the first quarter of 2012. Revenue from data plans now represents 43.6 percent of the carrier’s income. Data now brings in $6.9 billion, an 18.5 percent jump compared to the same period last year.

During the second quarter, Verizon Wireless added 888,000 net post-paid mobile subscribers, helping the company reach 94.2 million wireless customers, a 4.9 percent increase over the 88.8 million postpaid mobile customers reported during the same time in 2011. Under 1 percent of Verizon Wireless customers are jumping ship to other carriers, witnessed by the 0.84 percent “churn” rate.

The picture wasn’t so bright on the wireline side of Verizon’s business. While wireline subscriptions fell 3.1 percent in the second quarter, the more profitable FiOS service, which includes phone, internet and television, grew. FiOS sales now comprise 65 percent of the $9.9 billion in second-quarter revenue reported today. Verizon’s margin on wireline sales is slowly increasing from the 1.6 percent announced earlier this year. FiOS can be thanked there, too. While overall, a wireline customer brings in $100, an average FiOS subscriber provides more than $149, Verizon said. The company reports 5.1 million FiOS Internet customers and 4.5 million FiOS Video subscribers. Around 70 percent of FiOS customers opt for the phone, internet and video bundle, Verizon announced.

After rising more than 14 percent Wednesday, Verizon stock fell 1.5 percent to $45.22 before the markets opened in New York.

The seemingly mythical FreedomPop, which aims to disrupt the mobile broadband landscape by offering a freemium 4G service, is one step closer to reality. The company has raised $7.5 million in a first round of funding, led by ManGrove and DCM, VentureBeat has learned.

FreedomPop plans to file its Form D documents for the round tomorrow, which will show a $4.5 million investment from ManGrove and DCM. The remaining $3 million will show as a future traunch.

The brainchild of Skype cofounder Niklas Zennstrom, FreedomPop has gained quite a bit of attention because it aims to do the impossible: provide free and low-cost 4G broadband that’s supported by additional services. As large wireless carriers are happy to charge you more for faster wireless, FreedomPop could stand to gain from frustrated consumers. And if the company plays its cards right, it could end up replacing home broadband access for some.

FreedomPop aims to deliver its service across several devices, including an iPhone case (which effectively acts as a hotspot), a USB stick, and a wireless hotspot, according to our past reports. They’ll all be powered by 4G WiMax service from ClearWire and an unnamed wireless carrier. The company plans to start beta testing this Summer, and it just recently put its iPhone case up for preorder for $99.

We initially heard that FreedomPop was going to offer 1GB of free service monthly, with every additional gigabyte available for just $10. But according to a recent TechCrunch report, it looks like the company is now aiming for a safer 500MB of free service. The company also plans to offer innovative ways for users to gain free bandwidth by signing up their friends.

ManGrove and DCM will join existing investor Atomico, which was cofounded by Zennstrom.

Photo via mauriciosastre/YouTube

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

A day after resigning as chief executive at T-Mobile USA, Philipp Humm said he’ll lead rival Vodafone’s efforts in Europe, starting October 1.

Humm will become Vodafone’s chief executive in northern and central Europe for areas such as Britain, Germany, Turkey, and the Czech Republic, Reuters reports.

Humm’s announcement follows mixed messages from T-Mobile about the reasons he left Wednesday. Although  T-Mobile, the U.S. arm of Germany’s Deutsche Telekom, provided the usual cover about spending more time with his family, parent company Deutsche Telekom’s CEO Rene Obermann told  employees Humm was going to a rival.

Unlike T-Mobile USA, which has found it difficult to attract customers amid competition from AT&T and Verizon Wireless, Vodafone has thrived in Europe. Vodafone has been concentrated on northern Europe and so has seen success despite a slowdown in consumer interest in southern Europe.

In recognition of that bi-polar attitude, Vodafone announced today Humm would lead the northern Europe portion of the company, while Vodafone Italy chief executive Paolo Bertoluzzo would head the southern European region: Spain, Portugal, and Greece.

The new European structure “will underpin our strategy focused on meeting our customers’ long-term needs, and Paolo and Phillip will be strong additions to the Vodafone group executive committee,” said chief executive Vittorio Calao.

Humm’s departure from T-Mobile USA has been linked to the failed merger with AT&T. The giant U.S. carrier had offered $39 billion for T-Mobile USA, but after regulatory pressure, the merger was axed, and AT&T ended up paying T-Mobile $3 billion. Before moving to lead T-Mobile in 2010, Humm had overseen the parent company’s operations in Germany since 2005.

Photo: Sean Ludwig/VentureBeat

Design is determining the winners in everything mobile. The most successful players are focusing on one thing: How to make products, services, and devices as compelling and delightful as possible – visually, and experientially. MobileBeat 2012, July 10-11 in San Francisco , is assembling the most elite minds to debate how UI/UX is transforming every aspect of the mobile economy, and where the opportunities lie. Register here.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Intel has decided to beef up its strategy for mobile technology by purchasing 1,700 patents from InterDigital for $375 million in cash, the company announced today.

InterDigital is known for producing advanced wireless technology, and the patents it sold to Intel are primarily related to 3G, LTE, and 802.11 technologies. InterDigital said the sale represents a small portion of its overall patent library.

With the rate of mobile usage by consumers rapidly increasing, it’s understandable that Intel would want to make sure its future in this area is more secure.

“These patents will support Intel’s strategic investments in the mobile segment,” said Doug Melamed, Intel senior vice president and general counsel. “The addition of these patents expands our already large, strong, and diverse portfolio of intellectual property.

The companies expect the transaction to be completed in third quarter 2012, pending the approval from regulators and other customary closing conditions.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Sprint is no longer the majority stakeholder in high-speed wireless company Clearwire, the company announced today.

On the surface, this may seem like a set-back for the third largest carrier, which relies quite a bit on Clearwire for both its 3G and 4G WiMax networks for service to its customers. But this might actually benefit Sprint in the long run.

Back in December, Sprint agreed to pay $1.6 billion to Clearwire in exchange for unlimited access to Clearwire’s WiMax wireless network, which is noticeably slower and much harder to upgrade than the LTE networks used by competing carriers AT&T and Verizon. The move allowed investors (including Sprint) to breathe a sigh of relief, dispelling fears that the company would declare bankruptcy because it didn’t have enough cash on hand to run the business. However, Sprint was forced to reduce its voting rights to ensure that it wasn’t at risk of defaulting on that debt.

With Sprint no longer the majority owner, the company will get more control and less consequence. “Now that our economic interest has fallen below 50 percent, we are reclaiming our full voting rights so that our voting rights and economic rights are once again aligned,” Sprint spokesperson Scott Sloat told Reuters.

Sprint badly wants access to a LTE network, but with the company’s current standing in the market, it understandably wants to reduce the risk associated with building it out. That’s why the company first contracted with LightSquared for access to its LTE network. When that deal fell through, Sprint turned instead to Clearwire — further helping push the company forward.

Verizon is starting the year off in a good place with its first quarter earnings.The telecom announced today that it saw revenues increase 4.6 percent to $28.2 billion, up from $26.9 billion, with net income of $3.9 billion, an almost 20 percent jump from last year.

Verizon says it added 734,000 wireless customers (501,000 on contract) and saw low churn (users who leave) of .96 percent. Wireless revenues were up 7.7 percent at $15.4 billion and data revenues jumped 21.1 percent. Overall, Verizon now has 93 million wireless customers (88 million on contract), and 47 percent of its wireless customers use smartphones.

The company sold 6.3 million smartphones in the first quarter, and 72 percent of contract customers went for smartphones. Notably, Verizon says it sold 2.9 million 4G LTE devices this year. Its LTE network now covers more than two-thirds of the U.S. population in 230 markets.

On the wireline side, Verizon said that FiOS was 63 percent of its consumer revenue. The company now boasts 5 million FiOS Internet subscribers (up 193,000) and 4.4 million FiOS video subscribers. Speaking on Verizon’s earnings call today, Verizon CFO Fran Shammo said that the company would no longer offer DSL and other high-speed Internet in markets with FiOS. (No clue what this means for existing customers.)

Shammo also said on the earnings call that Verizon would be getting out of the calling card and public phone business.

“Verizon delivered double-digit earnings growth and strong cash flow this quarter,”  said Lowell McAdam, Verizon chairman and CEO, in the earnings statement today. “We built momentum coming out of 2011, and our results show that we continue to execute in the key growth  areas of our business. Verizon Wireless produced both great growth and great margins, and we produced another strong quarter of Fios growth. We are confident  we will improve Wireline margins for the full year. Our repositioning of Verizon enterprise solutions has better aligned our strengths in high-growth markets, and we expect our enterprise business to contribute even more to overall Wireline revenue growth and profitability over time.”

Top image via SNL’s Verizon sketch

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Two U.S. senators are asking federal regulators to reconsider their decision to forbid of troubled startup LightSquared from launching its high-speed wireless network.

LightSquared’s business strategy involved building out a high-speed wireless network that would generate revenue by selling network access to outside companies, such as Walmart, Best Buy, and others. In February, however, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rejected LightSquared’s plans to launch its LTE network due to concerns that it would interfere with both commercial and military GPS technology. Because of this development, several high-profile clients — such as Leap Wireless, FreedomPop, and Sprint-Nextel –  terminated their service agreements with LightSquared. The startup and its investors stand to lose billions if a solution to the interference problem isn’t found that is satisfactory to the FCC.

In response to LightSquared’s turmoil, Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) have asked FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski to allocate a different portion of spectrum to LightSquared, which would solve the GPS interference problems.

“In the short-term, we urge you to work with industry and the relevant federal agencies to find consensus on alternate spectrum for LightSquared’s proposed network,” the senators wrote in a letter obtained by The Hill. “Advancing LightSquared’s network in a consensus manner would increase competition in the wireless broadband market and promote the public interest.”

More recently, LightSquared investors are contemplating filing for voluntary bankruptcy, which could be the only option the startup has if a solution to the interference problem isn’t found soon.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Like an obnoxious school child that can’t help but point out when it thinks it’s right (note: this is never cute), AT&T said earlier today that T-Mobile’s massive layoffs wouldn’t have happened if the FCC allowed it to purchase the smaller carrier.

“Normally, we’d not comment on something like this,” wrote AT&T’s Jim Cicconi,  Senior Executive Vice President of External and Legislative Affairs, on the company’s public policy blog. “But I feel this is an exception for one big reason – only a few months ago AT&T promised to preserve these very same call centers and jobs if our merger was approved. We also predicted that if the merger failed, T-Mobile would be forced into major layoffs.”

Cicconi then goes on to rail against the FCC’s decision to block the $39 billion merger, saying (with a certain amount of glee), “The FCC may consider itself an expert agency on telecom, but it is not omniscient.”

The blog post is worth a read, if only for Cicconi’s glaring lack of self-awareness. It’s exactly this sort of swagger and sense of  self-entitlement that played a big role in the T-Mobile merger falling apart. From the beginning, AT&T acted like it was doing consumers a favor by gobbling up one of its biggest competitors and reducing the amount of wireless choice in the U.S. (of course, AT&T claimed it was helping the wireless market).

But then the FCC issued a report that took issue with pretty much all of the benefits AT&T claimed the merger would deliver. Notably (and particularly relevant to today’s news), the report found that the merger would cause significant job losses, even though AT&T said that it would create jobs. AT&T also claimed that it wouldn’t be able to build out its 4G LTE network without the acquisition, but the FCC found that the company would have had no issue achieving nationwide LTE coverage on its own.

Instead of addressing the issues the FCC brought up, AT&T said the report was merely a “draft” with no legal standing. The carrier never apologized for lying to consumers and regulators — so it’s particularly offensive to see it rubbing salt into T-Mobile’s wounds today.

Not surprisingly, AT&T eventually gave up on its merger plans because of the intense opposition from the FCC and the Department of Justice.

AT&T thought it could power through the merger with little effort, and it likely didn’t see the regulatory opposition coming. (Let’s not forget that the Comcast/NBC Universal merger was approved just a year ago.) Instead, it ended up paying a $4 billion breakup fee to T-Mobile parent Deutsche Telekom (in addition to spectrum and other assets).

To its credit, the FCC isn’t letting AT&T have the last word. “In a short period of time, T-Mobile has re-emerged as a vibrant competitor in the mobile marketplace,” an FCC representative told AllThingsD. “Competition benefits all wireless consumers. The bottom line is that AT&T’s proposal to acquire a major competitor was unprecedented in scope and the company’s own confidential documents showed that the merger would have resulted in significant job losses.”

VentureBeat is holding its second annual MobileSummit this April 2-3 in Sausalito, Calif. The invitation-only event will debate the five key business and technology challenges facing the mobile industry today, and participants — 180 mobile executives, investors, and policymakers — will develop concrete, actionable solutions that will shape the future of themobile industry. You can find out more at our Mobile Summit site.

More bad news for the struggling WiMAX wireless network Clearwire. Google is preparing to sell off its entire stake in the company, according to SEC documents filed by the search giant today.

Google originally purchased a 6.5 percent stake in Clearwire back in 2008 for a cool $500 million. The initial appeal of Clearwire was its faster 4G WiMAX wireless network, which has since fallen behind the new wireless carrier standard of LTE. More recently, Clearwire has struggled to pay its operating bills, forcing its majority shareholder Sprint to lend it an injection of cash.

The documents state that Google is seeking to get $1.60 per share for a total of $47 million — less than one-tenth the price it originally paid for Clearwire’s share. On the surface it seems that Google is simply trying to get rid of its involvement in an investment that doesn’t have any growing possibilities for the other parts of its business. However, it’s very likely Google expects Clearwire to fail, which could be one reason for the fire sale on its stake in the company.

Google’s shares will become available for sale February 27.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

The U.S. Security and Exchange Commission said Wednesday that AT&T and other wireless telecom companies will have to let shareholders vote on net neutrality, thanks in part to a proposal from a group that includes Mike D of the Beastie Boys.

Net neutrality, the notion that online traffic must be treated equally by ISPs, is now a “significant policy” issue, the SEC said in a letter posted on its website. The agency is recommending that AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon include a resolution in their annual shareholder votes declaring that they won’t treat data differently based on its “source, ownership or destination.”

The move comes in response to a proposal sent to the SEC by Trillium Asset Management, which represents Mike D and two other AT&T shareholders. Previously the SEC found net neutrality wasn’t a large enough issue to include in shareholder votes. But thanks to the policy push by the likes of Trillium, as well as the FCC’s own support of net neutrality for landline ISPs, it seems the tide is finally beginning to shift in favor of those who want fair wireless-web access.

Of course, the SEC’s recommendation doesn’t guarantee that carrier shareholders will vote in favor of net neutrality. But at least shareholders can now get their say, instead of just accepting the carrier’s position.

Via Bloomberg; Mike D photo via Fabbio Venni/Flickr

VentureBeat is holding its second annual Mobile Summit this April 2-3 in Sausalito, Calif. The invitation-only event will debate the five key business and technology challenges facing the mobile industry today, and participants — 180 mobile executives, investors, and policymakers — will develop concrete, actionable solutions that will shape the future of the mobile industry. You can find out more at our Mobile Summit site.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Hoping to dispel its reputation for terrible reliability, AT&T today revealed the dramatic extent of its network improvements in 2011 as part of its fourth quarter earnings announcement.

The carrier said it made over 150,000 improvements throughout last year, including the addition of more than 700,000 square miles of 3G coverage. AT&T also said that 3G call retainability across the nation is up 25 percent from last year.

The latter is something I’ve definitely noticed while using my iPhone in Brooklyn and Manhattan. It used to be that I would drop about 30 percent of my calls when traversing the city; now a dropped call is a rarity. AT&T boasts that its 3G call retainability has been above 99 percent since the middle of September.

AT&T said that 80 percent of its mobile traffic now goes over its enhanced backhaul, which refers to its HSPA+ network that powers non-LTE 4G devices. For most customers, that means slightly faster speeds than 3G, but nowhere near the improvement that LTE would bring. Technically, the iPhone 4S is a 4G device on AT&T’s network, since it supports 16 megabits per second HSPA+.

VentureBeat is holding its second annual Mobile Summit this April 2-3 in Sausalito, Calif. The invitation-only event will debate the five key business and technology challenges facing the mobile industry today, and participants — 180 mobile executives, investors, and policymakers — will develop concrete, actionable solutions that will shape the future of the mobile industry. You can find out more at our Mobile Summit site.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Echoing the sentiments of its competitors, AT&T today discussed the growing need for more wireless spectrum in the US and criticized the FCC’s inability to open up more spectrum, in its fourth quarter earnings call.

AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said the wireless industry is in the midst of tremendous growth, but “this growth cannot continue without more spectrum being cleared and brought to market.” He pointed out that the last big spectrum auction by the FCC was five years ago and that it seems like the agency is delaying its efforts to free up more spectrum.

“It appears the FCC is intent on picking winners and losers rather than letting the market work,” Stephenson said.

Strong words against the FCC aren’t unusual for mobile carriers, but I also got the sense that AT&T is particularly ticked off this time around given the agency’s hand in killing the T-Mobile merger, which cost the company $4 billion during the last quarter.

To deal with the massive increase in mobile data growth, Stephenson said, AT&T will “manage usage-based data plans, increased pricing and managing the speeds of the highest volume users.” The company should still be able to continue its LTE rollout with its current spectrum, and Stephenson noted that the technology is 30-40 percent more efficient than 3G. But he added, “LTE is important, but it is not the silver bullet in terms of capacity planning. What that means is that to meet customer demand we need to continue our spectrum push.”

“We have an industry clearly stuck in creating capacity,” Stephenson said. “Clearly it’s time for Congress and the FCC to step up.”

VentureBeat is holding its second annual Mobile Summit this April 2-3 in Sausalito, Calif. The invitation-only event will debate the five key business and technology challenges facing the mobile industry today, and participants — 180 mobile executives, investors, and policymakers — will develop concrete, actionable solutions that will shape the future of the mobile industry. You can find out more at our Mobile Summit site.

The wireless revolution is transforming lives everywhere today and is the reason Qualcomm spends $3 billion in research and development each year, said Jacobs, speaking onstage today at CES in Las Vegas. All sorts of mobile devices are just going to work together, he said.

Jacobs said that Qualcomm has shipped more than 7 billion wireless chip sets, making it the No. 1 supplier of wireless technology. About 1.5 billion 3G mobile connections exist, and the wireless industry’s revenues exceed $1.3 trillion on a global basis.

“All consumer electronics companies are already in the mobile industry or soon will be,” he said.

Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processors are used in more than 300 devices, and 350 more are in development. Qualcomm launched an app called GameCommand for Android in hopes of encouraging gaming on top of Snapdragon-based devices. Qualcomm’s S4 Snapdragon chip set will drive the next set of devices, from tablets to Windows 8 laptops. For the first time, Microsoft is crafting a Windows operating system to run on ARM-based chips, such as the Snapdragon.

The latter, Jacobs said, is “going to be a really exciting opportunity” for Snapdragon devices and “that is a game changer.” Jacobs demoed a Qualcomm Snapdragon-based tablet running Windows 8.

Emerging countries will be 50 percent of global GDP by 2014. In India, last year, mobile connections exceeded fixed landline connections. No matter where they are, people want to join the mobile revolution and become “citizens of a much larger world,” Jacobs said.

Jacobs said that Qualcomm has launched 73 projects for social good in a bunch of countries around the world. In one of them, Grameen Bank, which makes micro-finance loans to small business owners, gives low-income businesses a phone that can be shared among a group of businesspeople. Those who stay in the program for more than four months have doubled their income, and 100 percent are profitable.

“That’s one example of how mobile can improve people’s lives,” Jacobs said.

Stephen Elop, chief executive of Nokia, joined Jacobs on stage and said that the goal is to bring another billion people onto the internet via mobile.

For more news out of this week’s Consumer Electronics Show, be sure to check out VentureBeat’s live coverage from CES 2012.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Sure, AT&T’s grand plan to take over T-Mobile has fallen on its face, but at least the company now has more spectrum available for its budding 4G LTE network, thanks to government approval for a deal announced last year.

The FCC has approved AT&T’s $1.92 billion purchase of Qualcomm’s 700 megahertz spectrum, originally meant for the company’s failed FLO TV project, which AT&T will use to strengthen its LTE network.

Verizon is in the midst of several big spectrum deals of its own (which the government is also investigating), so this is a particularly desperate win for AT&T. And with the failure of the T-Mobile deal, which would have given AT&T plenty more spectrum, the carrier needs to scrape up as much wireless space as it can find.

Qualcomm’s block of spectrum covers more than 300 million people across the country, including major cities like New York, Boston, Los Angeles and San Francisco. AT&T says it intends to use the spectrum to increase the downstream speed and total capacity of its 4G network. The company will use carrier aggregation with the spectrum, a technology for LTE 4G networks that allows networks to use multiple frequencies to achieve high speeds, to combine its existing spectrum with Qualcomm’s.

The FCC has imposed few limitations on the deal, reports the Wall Street Journal, other than making sure AT&T keeps an eye on spectrum interference and offers data roaming to competitors. The agency didn’t force AT&T to make sure its wireless frequencies are compatible with nearby spectrum, something that smaller carriers have been pushing for.

Apparently, the FCC agreed with AT&T’s argument that ensuring frequency interoperability would slow down its 4G roll-out — though the agency did say that it will conduct an examination of the industry next year to determine if that’s truly the case.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

T-Mobile parent company Deutsche Telekom apparently put all of its eggs in AT&T’s basket. Now that AT&T’s $39 billion T-Mobile purchase has been squashed, thanks to pushback from the US government, DT is scrambling once again to find additional funds for its US carrier.

“There’s no Plan B,” T-Mobile spokesman Andreas Fuchs said, according to the New York Times. “We’re back at the starting point.”

Deutsche Telekom will receive $4 billion in spectrum and assets from AT&T as compensation for the deal’s failure to close. The company will also form a “mutually beneficial roaming agreement” with AT&T. But DT still needs a longer term solution to keep its T-Mobile business afloat, which has been losing subscribers and profits over the last few years. (Notably, T-Mobile remains the only U.S. carrier without the iPhone.)

“With the spectrum we’re getting, we have a better chance of expanding the network in many markets,” Deutsche Telekom CEO René Obermann said during a conference call today. “That is not a final solution. In the long-term, we need more spectrum and network capacity. We are working on that.”

It’s unclear what lies in T-Mobile’s future. The company has invested heavily in HSPA+ technology for its “4G” network (the technology is faster than typical 3G, but technically not 4G like LTE) and it has landed a handful of interesting Android smartphones. But T-Mobile’s phone variety remains limited, and without the iPhone it won’t be able to effectively compete against AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

AT&T has abandoned its plans to take over T-Mobile due to too much opposition from the FCC and the Department of Justice, the company announced this afternoon.

AT&T sought to buy T-Mobile from its parent, Deutsche Telekom, for $39 billion, but lawsuits and vocal opposition from the U.S. government have been piling up. On top of an lawsuit issued by the DOJ in August, the FCC went on the record in late November by saying the merger would ultimately hurt U.S. consumers and the wireless market.

The main goal of the T-Mobile acquisition was for that company’s valuable wireless spectrum. Randall Stephenson, AT&T chairman and CEO, said in a statement that AT&T planned to keep heavily investing in wireless technology, but it urges Congress to address the issue of unused wireless spectrum.

“To meet the needs of our customers, we will continue to invest,” Stephenson said. “However, adding capacity to meet these needs will require policymakers to do two things. First, in the near term, they should allow the free markets to work so that additional spectrum is available to meet the immediate needs of the U.S. wireless industry, including expeditiously approving our acquisition of unused Qualcomm spectrum currently pending before the FCC. Second, policymakers should enact legislation to meet our nation’s longer-term spectrum needs.”

AT&T will have to pay Deutsche Telekom $4 billion because the deal fell through, but said it also plans to “enter a mutually beneficial roaming agreement with Deutsche Telekom.” In theory, that should mean AT&T and T-Mobile customers should end up better off, even though the deal was killed.

The biggest winner of a dead deal between AT&T and T-Mobile is clearly Sprint, which would have become far and away the smallest major U.S. carrier. Sprint had also sued AT&T to stop the merger. Sprint’s shares are trading up 6 percent in after-hours trading, while AT&T’s share price is nearly unchanged.

Are you glad the deal is dead?

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

T-Mobile certainly won’t be lacking in suitors if AT&T’s $39 billion acquisition falls through. Dish Network is interested in partnering with T-Mobile for a wireless network of its own, if AT&T can’t seal the deal, Dish CEO Joseph Clayton said in an interview today.

Clayton joined Dish earlier this year with the promise of upping acquisitions and creating a streaming-video competitor to Netflix. He says that the company could combine its newfound wireless spectrum — a product of its Terrestar Networks and DBSD purchases — with a wireless provider like T-Mobile to create an entirely new company, Bloomberg reports.

But even if T-Mobile gets snapped up by AT&T, Clayton says he’s considering similar partnerships with Sprint or Clearwire. He’s also interested in buying additional spectrum from AT&T and T-Mobile if federal regulators force the companies to give up assets.

However it’s put together, a Dish-backed wireless network could be interesting competition against more entrenched carriers and telecom networks. And for ailing carriers like Sprint and T-Mobile, buddying up with Dish could be a wise decision.

“We’re not interested in making money on selling our spectrum,” Clayton told Bloomberg in an interview. “We want to use it to create a national wireless network, video, voice and data. We’ve got expertise in satellite-TV, and we will in satellite broadband. The voice part, we’ll need some help with.”

But before Dish can do anything, it needs to wait for the FCC to approve the use of its new wireless spectrum. Another roadblock for Dish: T-Mobile parent Deutsche Telekom apparently isn’t even thinking of a potential deal with the satellite company, a spokesman told Bloomberg.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Mobile broadband startup LightSquared’s GPS interference troubles aren’t over yet. The company’s LTE network has been found to disrupt 75 percent of GPS devices in a government test, Bloomberg reports.

The test, conducted by the National Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Systems Engineering Forum, found that 69 of 92 selected GPS devices “experienced harmful interference” within 100 meters of a LightSquared base station.

“LightSquared signals caused harmful interference to majority of GPS receivers tested,” according to a draft of the test report. “No additional testing is required to confirm harmful interference exists.”

For months, LightSquared has been facing criticism from the GPS industry and government agencies over the spectrum used by its LTE network, which is dangerously close to the wireless spectrum used by GPS devices. LightSquared has said that it’s working on reallocating the spectrum its network uses, but it also blamed the GPS industry for creating devices that don’t stay within their required spectrum ranges.

Most recently, LightSquared has said that a new antenna could help to alleviate GPS interference. It’s unclear if that new antenna was being used for this test. The company is also planning to run its base stations at lower power levels than the government test, which should interfere with fewer GPS devices, executive vice president Martin Harriman told Bloomberg.

Reston, Virginia-based LightSquared was founded by billionaire Philip Falcone with the goal of reselling its LTE mobile broadband network, which will cover up to 260 million people, to others. That’s not going to happen until the company can fix its GPS problems.

In an e-mail to Bloomberg, Harriman said LightSquared is “outraged by the illegal leak of incomplete government data… This breach attempts to draw an inaccurate conclusion to negatively influence the future of LightSquared and narrowly serve the business interests of the GPS industry.”