Despite being part of the recent incentive auction, where the FCC was auctioning off 600MHz spectrum to the carriers, Verizon did not bid at all in this auction. Now the company has taken some time to explain exactly why they did not bid for the 600MHz spectrum, and basically, they didn’t need it. In their blog post, Verizon talks about how they have plenty of spectrum in the 700, 850 and 1900 MHz bands, so that the 600MHz band wasn’t needed.
With 5G being the next step in the wireless evolution, carriers are going to be looking for high-band spectrum, which is not the 600MHz spectrum that was auctioned off. Verizon already has a good amount of sub-1GHz spectrum, and plenty of it for their upcoming 5G network. They are looking for high-band spectrum, which allows carriers to have more bandwidth while low-band spectrum can cover more area.
Verizon also mentions how one of their competitors spent nearly $8 billion on the 600MHz spectrum, which won’t be available to use for quite a while, and how that competitor needed the spectrum desperately. Of course, that competitor is T-Mobile, and they did need the spectrum, seeing as they only have 700MHz spectrum for low-band, and it’s not available nationwide for them, seeing as Verizon does still own a big part of that spectrum and are actively using it. Verizon says that T-Mobile is still trying to catch up in 4G LTE, while they have had the best 4G LTE network for over 7 years now. Which is true, because Verizon was one of the first to launch a 4G LTE network, and have continued to grow and make the network even better over the years since.
None of this news is actually a surprise, we all knew that Verizon had plenty of sub-1GHz spectrum, and with 5G coming, everyone is looking at high-band spectrum, like Sprint’s 2.5GHz spectrum that they are using for 4G LTE right now. But it is great to see Verizon explaining why they didn’t make a single bid in the 600MHz auction that took place earlier this year. You can find their blog post in the source section below.