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Continued ...

European markets:

Clearwire has been buying licenses since 2004 as Europe has gone through a wave of 3.5GHz auctions, often with very low prices because of the (soon to be changed) fixed wireless restrictions and the shortage, before WiMAX, of technologies that could deliver advanced services in this band at a reasonable level of capex and opex. The operator has licenses in Belgium, Germany, Ireland, Poland, Romania and Spain, and also in Denmark through its affiliate Danske Telecom. However, its actual operations are in the early stages. At the end of March, it had 51,000 customers in the markets that have gone live - Brussels and Ghent in Belgium; Dublin, Ireland; and Seville, Spain. The slow progress indicates why Clearwire needs partners with the need to build out major networks and the will and finance to take on the majors - while eastern Europe has many opportunities for new operators, the west is a far harder competitive landscape than north America, because of high mobile penetration; rapidly spreading availability of HSPA, delivering true broadband; and the power of the major cellcos, many of which are owned by national wireline incumbents.

In the US, the current Clearwire will deploy its first 802.16e network in Portland, Oregon, while its future spouse Sprint Xohm will go commercial initially in Baltimore. Wolff said there will be 300 cell sites in the first stage Portland network, which will launch towards the end of the year, and is currently going through beta trials with about 200 customers. The next commercial Mobile WiMAX roll-outs will come in Atlanta, Georgia; Las Vegas, Nevada; and Grand Rapids, Michigan.

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