
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, December 6, 1994                   TAG: 9412060079
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

MOBILE-PHONE AUCTION BEGINS

Dangling a Dick Tracy-like wrist phone, Vice President Al Gore opened the first auction for new mobile phone licenses, the most sought-after and potentially lucrative communication licenses the federal government has ever made available.

The auction is expected to raise billions for the U.S. Treasury and speed up the licensing process. It will continue until there are no new bids for any of the 99 licenses on the block. It could last for weeks or months, Federal Communications Commission officials said.

Thirty companies are competing for the licenses, which permit them to serve specific geographic areas and operate on specific slices of the public's airwaves.

The new mobile phone licenses are for a service that promises to be more mobile and less expensive than existing cellular service.

The technical configuration and the economics of the new service are expected to spur the creation of an array of small, lightweight communications devices.

Under the plan, up to six companies could provide mobile phone service in a given market.

The licenses now at stake are for 51 major regional markets. Smaller-market licenses will be auctioned next year.

Competition from these new wireless services should also lead to lower rates for local telephone service, which is delivered over wired networks, Gore said.

Gore called for any surplus in auction revenues to go to school districts to help buy equipment to hook into the information superhighway - a collection of two-way telecommunication networks delivering voice, video and data.

by CNB