The FCC Tells Google (GOOG) To Go Home

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
By Douglas A. McIntyre Published
This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

According to the FT, the chairman of the FCC has told Congress that he will not support Google’s (GOOG) proposal to open up part of the US wireless spectrum to make capacity available on a wholesale basis that would allow other carriers to use it. The FT wrote that: "Kevin Martin, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, indicated in hearings before a House subcommittee that he would not support the Google proposal."

Most other FCC commissioners said they would support the agency’s chairman. Reuters writes that: "Three of the five FCC commissioners told lawmakers at a congressional hearing they were in favor of a proposal that requires whomever wins the bidding for part of the airwaves to make them accessible to any device or software application." 

Google offered to make a major bid of at least $4.6 billion for licenses if the FCC would accept four conditions:

  • Open applications: Consumers should be able to download and utilize any software applications, content, or services they desire;
  • Open devices: Consumers should be able to utilize a handheld communications device with whatever wireless network they prefer;
  • Open services: Third parties (resellers) should be able to acquire wireless services from a 700 MHz licensee on a wholesale basis, based on reasonably nondiscriminatory commercial terms; and
  • Open networks: Third parties (like internet service providers) should be able to interconnect at any technically feasible point in a 700 MHz licensee’s wireless network.
  • It would appear that it is dead now and Google will walk.

    Douglas A. McIntyre

    Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
    About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

    Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

    McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

    His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

    A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

    TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

    McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

    Featured Reads

    Our top personal finance-related articles today. Your wallet will thank you later.

    Continue Reading

    Top Gaining Stocks

    CBOE Vol: 1,568,143
    PSKY Vol: 12,285,993
    STX Vol: 7,378,346
    ORCL Vol: 26,317,675
    DDOG Vol: 6,247,779

    Top Losing Stocks

    LKQ
    LKQ Vol: 4,367,433
    CLX Vol: 13,260,523
    SYK Vol: 4,519,455
    MHK Vol: 1,859,865
    AMGN Vol: 3,818,618