Google Buy Their Own Mobile Phone Network for $4.6bn?

Google has agreed to bid a minimum $4.6bn in the forthcoming auction for a US mobile phone network license. In typical Google fashion they are not content with simply joining a new industry; they want to revolutionise it!

Google has requested that the commission running the networks in the US, opens up the industry so that “consumers’ interests are served”. They want the industry to adopt four types of “open” platforms:

Open applications: Consumers should be able to download and utilise any software applications, content, or services they desire;
Open devices: Consumers should be able to utilise a hand-held communications device with whatever wireless network they prefer;
Open services: Third parties should be able to acquire wireless services from a 700 MHz licensee on a wholesale basis, based on reasonably non-discriminatory commercial terms; and
Open networks: Third parties (like internet service providers) should be able to interconnect at any technically feasible point in a 700 MHz licensee’s wireless network.

This type of open industry would suit Google who are experts at selling advertising space, but would potentially hurt the other major US networks: Sprint, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, who rely on users paying per call or a monthly subscription. Google’s normal business model is to give services away for free and make their money from advertising revenue. So in a few years you may be able to use Google’s mobile phone network for free, wouldn’t that be nice?