Aloha Partners LP is a telecommunications company based in

Providence, RI Providence () is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. The county seat of Providence County, it is one of the oldest cities in New England, founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and ...

. It is the largest owner of 700 MHz

spectrum A spectrum (: spectra or spectrums) is a set of related ideas, objects, or properties whose features overlap such that they blend to form a continuum. The word ''spectrum'' was first used scientifically in optics to describe the rainbow of co ...

in the United States.

History

Aloha Partners LP is and was the largest buyer of spectrum in the

FCC The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains ju ...

auctions of radio frequencies in the 700 MHz band in 2001 and 2003. Since that time, Aloha has also acquired the second largest (Cavalier Group LLC) and third largest (DataCom Wireless LLC) owners of 700 MHz spectrum. As a result, Aloha currently owns 12 MHz of spectrum covering 60% of the United States - including all the top 10 markets and 84% of the population in the top 40 markets. On September 19, 2007, Aloha Partners announced that it had reached an agreement with LIN Television Corp. to purchase their entire catalog of 31 spectrum licenses in the 700 MHz band. On February 4, 2008, the FCC approved the $2.5 billion buyout of Aloha Partners by

AT&T Mobility AT&T Mobility, LLC, also known as AT&T Wireless and Trade name, marketed as simply AT&T, is an American telecommunications company. Formed in April 2000 as Cingular Wireless LLC, It is a wholly owned subsidiary of AT&T, AT&T Inc. and provide ...

. This gives AT&T control of former television channel 54 and 59 in a coverage area which includes 72 of the top 100 metropolitan areas and a grand total of 196 million people in 281 markets. The next-largest owner of 700 MHz spectrum is

Qualcomm Qualcomm Incorporated () is an American multinational corporation headquartered in San Diego, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. It creates semiconductors, software and services related to wireless techn ...

, which owns channel 55 nationwide for use by its

MediaFLO MediaFLO was a technology developed by Qualcomm for transmitting audio, video and data to portable devices such as mobile phones and personal televisions, used for mobile television. Qualcomm operated a mobile pay television service, FLO TV, from ...

system.

References

External links

Official website
Telecommunications companies of the United States Companies based in Rhode Island {{telecom-company-stub