Clearwire closed $734 million in funding needed for the continued rollout of its network.
The funding consists of $402.5 million from the public offering of 201,250,000 shares of Class A common stock at $2.00 per share. An original offering announced on December 5, 2011 comprised 175,000,000 shares of Class A common stock. An additional 26,250,000 shares of Class A common stock was added pursuant to the underwriters’ exercise of their over-allotment option. From this offering, Clearwire will net proceeds of $384.1 million, after underwriters’ discounts and commissions.
In addition, Sprint exercised its preemptive rights to purchase 173,635,000 shares of Class B Common Stock and a corresponding number of Class B units in Clearwire Communications LLC,. This provides Clearwire with an additional $331.4 million in net proceeds. The total net new capital available to Clearwire $715.5 million.
“This equity raise is a critical step for Clearwire to achieve its long-term business plan of creating the first wide-channel TDD-LTE 4G network in the U.S.,�? said Erik Prusch, president and CEO of Clearwire. “The added resources will enable us to continue delivering 4G mobile broadband service to meet the rapidly growing demand in the industry. We remain ideally and uniquely positioned to serve both wholesale and retail customers well into the future.”http://www.clearwire.com
- Earlier this month, Sprint Nextel and Clearwire reached agreements valued at up to $1.6 billion over the next four years in payments for WiMAX services, possible pre-payments for LTE services and potential equity investments. The agreements further align Clearwire’s LTE network build as a complement to Sprint’s Network Vision strategy. Plans lay the foundation for the deployment of Clearwire’s LTE Advanced-ready overlay network and outline the terms for Sprint to gain access to the additional LTE capacity. Clearwire and Sprint will collaborate on a network build plan and will jointly select LTE macro-cell sites to cover Sprint’s high usage area hotspots. Clearwire and Sprint will work collaboratively to support the ecosystem for TDD-LTE in Band Class 41 for devices, chipsets and standards.
