spectrum to meet demand for wireless broadband, page-9

Unwired WiMAX rollout announcement due imminently?..August 27th, 2009

Unwired may announce its long-awaited WiMAX rollout as early as next week, according to sources. Hinted at by parent company Seven Network in its full year financial results, Unwired is expected to be on the cusp of announcing plans for a WiMAX build which could finally make use of its metro spectrum holdings in the 2.3 and 3.5GHz bands (shared with regional Pay TV company Austar.)

A brief note in Seven’s results presentation stated “Unwired rollout announcement due soon.” Unwired regulatory director David Havyatt would not elaborate except to say “I don’t think Seven has made that up.”

Huawei and Motorola are said to have been in the running for Unwired’s 802.16e mobile WiMAX build for some time. CommsDay reported last month that rival Fujitsu made a late entry onto the scene, providing a base station for a live trial covering the International Grammar School in Sydney, where some two dozen students were supplied with Lenovo laptop computers and USB WiMAX dongles from supplier MiMAX.

An announcement on a WiMAX build may come as a surprise to some, with Unwired previously said to have put build plans on ice until a government announcement was made on the use of WiMAX for the rural and regional 10% of the NBN.

Aside from the potential build, Seven reported that its investment in Unwired had made a $62.7m loss in the full-year period. Of that figure, Unwired brought in $1.5m in earnings before tax, depreciation and amortisation, losing $29.0m in depreciation and amortisation to deliver pre-tax earnings of -$27.5m. Unwired also booked a -$35.2m impairment on its spectrum licenses.

Seven’s loss-making VoIP outfit Engin showed improvements in its financial results, with a 44% improvement in losses from -$12.1m last year to -$6.7m this year. Operating revenue increased 2.3% to $20.2m, while operating expenditure dropped 40% to $13.1m. Engin’s EBITDA loss improved by 82% from -$6.8m last year to -$1.4m this year.