McCaw To Launch Wireless Broadband Service
McCaw's Clearwire will offer the service in two cities this summer, Jacksonville, Fla., and St. Cloud, Minn.
Clearwire plans to expand the service nationally, according to its Web site. Its pitch is affordable high-speed Internet connections with a five-minute installation.
Clearwire will use a wireless transmission technology called OFDM and equipment made by NextNet Wireless, another McCaw-owned company, according to a manager at a competing equipment maker who is familiar with Clearwire's plans.
A spokesman for Clearwire was traveling and did not immediately return calls.
McCaw created a national wireless phone company in the 1980s that he sold to AT&T in 1994 for $11.5 billion. He is a major shareholder of Nextel Communications.
His less successful investments include XO Communications, a broadband company he founded in 1994 that filed for bankruptcy court protection in 2002. His private investment company, Eagle River, sunk $5 billion into satellite company Iridium before pulling out.
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