Clearwire increased its public stock offering announced Monday from $300 million to $350 million, which the cash-strapped wireless broadband provider intends to use to build out Long Term Evolution on top of its nationwide WiMax network.
Clearwire is offering 175 million shares priced at $2 per share to the public, it announced late Wednesday. The company's stock closed at $2.28 per share on Wednesday, down 8.8% for the day. The offering is expected to close on Dec. 13.
In morning trading Thursday, Clearwire's stock was down 7%, to $2.12 per share.
In addition, Sprint Nextel -- Clearwire's majority owner with a 49.6% voting stake -- agreed to buy in a separate, private transaction, approximately 172 million additional shares of Clearwire's Class B common stock to maintain its voting interest. Last week Sprint and Clearwire reached an agreement that potentially could provide up to $1.6 billion in payments and funding to Clearwire over the next four years.
Separately, Comcast and Time Warner Cable, which are investors in Clearwire, have said that within six months they will no longer offer wireless broadband services through the WiMax provider. Instead, Comcast and TWC (as well as Bright House Networks) will exclusively resell Verizon Wireless products and services under the terms of an agreement announced last week that included the sale of Advanced Wireless Services spectrum licenses to Verizon Wireless for $3.6 billion.
As part of the stock offering, Clearwire has granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional $52.5 million, or 26.25 million shares, of its Class A common stock. J.P. Morgan, BofA Merrill Lynch and Jefferies are acting as joint book-running managers for the offering.
