Rogers, Bell willing to buy WIND's spectrum

While Canadian carrier hopeful WIND might not be launching any time soon thanks to its foreign ownership structure, outsiders are already drooling at the prospect of buying up all of WIND’s spectrum in the event that it doesn’t launch. WIND CEO Ken Campbell dismissed such things as “media speculation” during our interview with him and repeated ad nauseam that WIND is currently weighing its options, but now more of its would be competitors are speaking up on what might be. Said Rogers CEO Nadir Mohamed on Friday: “Spectrum is a very valuable asset. Rogers for sure would be interested in picking it up.” Snapping up all of WIND’s spectrum wouldn’t be cheap considering it was originally purchased from Industry Canada in 2008 at a cost of $442.1 million Canadian ($420.4 million USD), but the possibility that several of the Big Three would buy it in parcels if the launch never happens remains relatively high. After all, Bell has previously said it would be willing to purchase half of WIND’s spectrum at $0.50 on the dollar.

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