Alvarion gets $100 Million contract with Open Range- not with Clearwire (as rumored)

[Alan J Weissberger]

Alvarion® and Open Range Sign a Multi-Year Contract for Equipment and Services Expected at Over $100 Million for 4G Network Across 17 States

This will be the nation’s largest Rural Utilities Service (RUS) funded deployment spanning 17 states, 546 rural communities, and reaching up to 6 million people. With this new broadband wireless network, Open Range will begin offering state-of-the-art 4G services to un-served and underserved customers across rural America in the fourth quarter of this year.

http://www.alvarion.com/presscenter/pressreleases/185114/

Open Range began making concrete plans for deploying its network this past January, when it secured $374 million to build out the network. The company received $100 million from One Equity Partners, the private equity arm of JP Morgan Chase, and also received a $267 million loan from the Rural Utilities Service. The company's wireless network will cover rural parts of Western states California, Colorado and Nevada; Midwestern states Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Nebraska; Southern states Arkansas, Alabama, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina; and eastern states Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey and Delaware.

When completed, the network is expected to span 17 states and 546 rural communities, making it one of the largest WiMAX deployments in the United States. Open Range is planning to light up the network and offer services in certain areas for it sometime in the fourth quarter . The company estimates that the entire network will take roughly five years to complete.

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/061709-alvarion-wimax.html


Comment: This shows the U.S. government is really serious about making broadband available to underserved and unserved geographical areas. As the RUS and NTIA broadband stimulus funding starts to get disbursed, we expect more of these announcements.

[Gary]

The Open Range funding commitment was made well before the signing of ARRA - so it's not a "stimulus" project per se. What I find interesting is that since the initial PR blitz about the funding, Open Range has been very quiet about firm implementation plans and rollout-out schedule; maybe this is set to change.

[Paul Sergeant]

Congratulations to my Alvarion friends

[Alan J Weissberger]

Where will the Broadband stimulus money go?

We hear that most (.50%) of the US broadband stimulus loans and grants from RUS and NTIA will be for new fiber optic build-outs (perhaps with DSL tail circuits). We think that perhaps 40-45% will go to broadband wireless providers (WISPs, independent telcos, and utilities). I would guess a total of $3B would be available for WiMAX deployments, most of it in the 3.65 "Lightly Licensed" spectrum where almost all deployments are based on 802.16d- Fixed WiMAX.