As set out in our report of May 31, 2024, there were many potential buyers of T-Mobile’s 800 MHz spectrum. In particular, electric utilities were a prime candidate but as we observed “enough of them would have to band together in order to make a bid of sufficient size to meeting T-Mobile’s reserve price”, of $3.59 billion or about $0.80 per MHz-pop. This appeared to be a significant barrier for a sale of the complete portfolio directly to utilities.
In its IIIQ 2024 investor call, T-Mobile said, with respect to 800 MHz and per the transcript, “We were required to sell it as an artifact of the merger and the consent decree and to auction it under a set of auction rules. We did that, and there wasn’t a qualifying bid as defined in the consent decree. And so we’re no longer are required to sell it. That gives us optionality.”
Now, in March 2025, Grain Management has stepped up and has an agreement involving the acquisition of the 800 MHz licenses from T-Mobile. Grain has applied, per filings with the FCC, to acquire the T-Mobile 800 MHz licenses subject to approval of an application to the FCC for waiver of build-out deadlines relating to license renewal and other conditions.
Grain has positioned the transaction as “an innovative and market-driven band repurposing plan that leverages the benefits of a common nationwide 800 MHz band for utilities and other enterprises“. The FCC application states that Grain is intending to create an 800 MHz market for anyone needing low-band spectrum.
As part of this, Grain is also transferring its 600 MHz licenses to T-Mobile. Grain acquired 26 licenses in 600 MHz in FCC Auction 1002 for $296 million or $0.67 per MHz-pop about 27% below the auction average. Grain and T-Mobile recently agreed to a short term leasing arrangement for these licenses, as per an application to the FCC in early February 2025.
This Grain transaction would result in a net decrease (of varying amount) in the amount of low-band spectrum owned by T-Mobile in every area, thereby potentially benefiting T-Mobile in the review of the UScellular acquisition.
Each of the 800 MHz licenses is 13.2 MHz or 14 MHz, known as the extended cellular band 3GPP Band n26 (actually only 10 MHz), which is included in essentially all mobile phones. Electric utilities in particular can make use of the 800 MHz spectrum for their own critical applications – private mobile networks, monitoring, SCADA, controls, meter reading, etc. In addition, T-Mobile has recently proposed to 3GPP to use a larger 7×7 MHz MHz channel in Band 26 to enhance the efficient use of spectrum in that band.
Interestingly, the 800 MHz licenses will provide competition for Anterix, who has been targeting utilities with 900 MHz and CBRS spectrum. Although Anterix’s 900 MHz spectrum has traditionally been licensed with only 6 MHz, the FCC approved an increase to 10 MHz in January 2025 making it more competitive with the 800 MHz band.
Competition to serve the utilities and other non-traditional applications is thus heating up… Grain by selling 800 MHz licenses, Anterix with 900 MHz licenses and of course a number of utilities and others independently own spectrum licenses, notably in the CBRS band.
In parallel with this, there is a considerable reshuffling of blocks and bands underway amongst T-Mobile, Verizon and AT&T.
This includes: some 600 MHz going from Verizon to T-Mobile along with swaps of PCS and AWS; swaps of PCS and AWS between T-Mobile and AT&T. And contingent on closing of T-Mobile’s acquisition of UScellular, there are AT&T’s proposed acquisition of UScellular 3450 MHz and 700 MHz licenses and Verizon’s proposed acquisition of UScellular 850 MHz and some of its AWS and PCS licenses. T-Mobile’s acquisition of UScellular itself involves licenses in 600 MHz, 700 MHz, AWS, PCS 2.5 GHz and 24 GHz. Also possibly still in play are T-Mobile’s 3450 MHz licenses that had been proposed for sale to Columbia Capital. In addition, Echostar is taking offers to lease a large number of its spectrum holdings.
And all of this is against a backdrop of new but limited spectrum coming from the FCC. As we noted, this includes returned and leftover AWS-3 licenses, which can be auctioned without renewal of the FCC’s auction authority, and new Upper C-Band frequencies, that, in this case, would require restoration of the FCC’s auction authority. And potentially Lower 3 GHz if a way forward can be found with the Department of Defense that currently occupies those frequencies.
Please contact us to obtain more details and discuss how LYA can help you achieve your spectrum goals. We look forward to hear from you.