Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Urban Communicators Rides NextWave Legal Legacy

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2003 08:44:30 -0400

Urban Communicators Rides NextWave Legal Legacy

The Federal Communications Commission waited as long as it could before
acknowledging it in an order released this week, but it was clear months ago that
Urban Communicators PCS would regain its spectrum licenses because NextWave
Telecom had prevailed in its legal dispute with the commission. In its order, the
FCC waited until the next to last paragraph of the document to acknowledge that
the NextWave case trumped its resistance to allowing Washington, D.C.-based Urban
Communicators to regain the 10 licenses around North Carolina that it bid $75
million for in 1996. This delaying tactic wasn't lost on Urban Communicators'
general counsel and stakeholder, Washington attorney James Winston, "They said it
in the most convoluted way they could possibly come out with," Winston told PBI
Media's Wireless Data News newsletter.

Like NextWave, Urban Com filed to reorganize under Chapter 11 bankruptcy after
acquiring 1900 MHz spectrum licenses in a 1996 auction limited to small and
minority-owned companies. However, the FCC canceled licenses won by NextWave
(which bid nearly $5 billion for licenses covering 96 of the largest markets
across the country), Urban Communicators and numerous other companies after they
failed to make required payments on their bids. While NextWave's dispute with the
FCC pushed through the legal process to the Supreme Court, a federal appeals court
held Urban Communicators' appeal of the FCC's action until the NextWave dispute
was settled. That happened in January when the High Court sided with NextWave.
Also like NextWave, Urban Communicators now has the option of selling its licenses
or proceeding with its original plan to build and operate a network.

"We've been put in a position where we can start working on a plan of
reorganization," Winston said. "We had to have our licenses reinstated just to
talk seriously about what comes next." PBI Media newsletter Wireless Data News has
tracked the FCC's disputes with spectrum licenses holders as well as other legal
issues affecting the delivery of wireless data services.

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