Round 11: FCC's Spectrum Auction Brings in Another $23 Million

The forward auction will continue to an even dozen rounds Friday as stage 4 appears to have found a comfort zone of continued sporadic bidding in smaller markets that boosts the bid total in each round by about $20 million, give or take a few million, and keeps the auction going until there is no demand in any of the 416 markets (actually PEAs, or partial economic areas).

The FCC is hoping to get the bidders out of that comfort zone a bit by speeding the bidding, increasing from two rounds per day to four starting Jan. 30.

In round 11, the increase was $23 million, up from $18,522,512,787 in round 10 to $18,545,525,787 in round 11.

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.