T-Mobile forks over $308M for US Cellular spectrum

From CNET News.com: T-Mobile customers in places like St. Louis and New Orleans are about to get a boost in coverage.

The wireless carrier has agreed to pay $308 million in cash for U.S. Cellular spectrum to expand its footprint in the Mississippi Valley region. Specifically, T-Mobile said it will buy 10 MHz of Advanced Wireless Services spectrum that covers 32 million people in 29 markets, including St. Louis; Nashville and Memphis, Tenn.; Kansas City; Lexington and Louisville, Ky.; Little Rock-North Little Rock, Ark.; Birmingham, Ala.; and New Orleans.

The company noted the additional spectrum will allow T-Mobile to incrementally roll out its 4G LTE network coverage to new markets and will expand the existing 4G LTE bandwidth in the region.

"In today's marketplace, spectrum is gold," T-Mobile CEO John Legere said in a press release. "This is a rare opportunity to secure precious AWS spectrum in key markets that will immediately be put to use by both T-Mobile and MetroPCS customers."

U.S. Cellular, meanwhile, said it will partition and retain a portion of the licenses covering its markets in Knoxville and eastern Tennessee to meet future operating needs.

The company also noted that since selling spectrum to Sprint in May, it has been looking for opportunities to sell other non-strategic assets.

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