XM Agrees To Buy WCS Wireless

ZDNet: XM Satellite Radio has agreed to buy privately held WCS Wireless in a stock deal reportedly worth $198 million. The principal assets of WCS Wireless are wireless spectrum licenses in geographic areas covering 163 million people throughout the U.S., including 15 of the top 20 metropolitan markets. As a result of the acquisition, XM will gain additional frequencies to broaden its offerings into multimedia subscription services such areas as video and data...Under the terms of the deal (which could close before year's end - subject to regulatory approval) XM offered 5.5 million of its shares for the assets of WCS Wireless. The expansionary move comes after Sirius announced last month that it also will be diving into video soon...

According to XM Chairman Gary Parsons, "This essentially doubles the amount of capacity we've had available and while we've demonstrated video, we had not seen a compelling business model for this going forward. This could mean we have a compelling business case." Read the full press release HERE.