FCC's 28 GHz Auction Pauses

The final three rounds of the FCC's 28 GHz auction before the break for Wednesday's national day of mourning saw bidding on the same 2,720 licenses. At press time, the the total provisional winning bids (PWBs) for those licenses was $558,198,210 for almost 95% of the available licenses.

Related: FCC Seeks to Spur Auction

The FCC is looking to speed the auction Thursday by requiring bidders to be active on virtually all 99% of the licenses they are bidding on.

The FCC does not have to auction the remaining 352 licenses since the minimum aggregate bid on all the licenses was a low $40 million, an effort to get the spectrum out into the market for 5G wireless broadband. 

When this auction concludes, a subsequent 24 GHz auction begins, with three more spectrum auctions planned for next year as the FCC prepares for the internet of everything world.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.