H Block Update: $1.3 Billion Bid

After 64 rounds of bidding, the FCC's H Block auction has drawn a total of $1,312,632,000. There were only four new bids this round, down from nine in the round before. One of the 176 licenses up for auction has no bid after its single bid was withdrawn last week.

Not surprisingly, the top market, New York, has drawn the top bid of $216,955,000 but it has appeared to top out at that figure, with no new bids since round 24.

The H block is one of three wireless spectrum auctions mandated by Congress and culminating in the mid-2015-targeted broadcast incentive auction.

The auction has to raise at least $1.564 billion in aggregate, but Dish has pledged that the auction will raise at least that much, a deal it struck in exchange for a waiver on adjacent spectrum that it said was the quid pro quo for it being able to bid at all.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.