Ligado Secures
Significant New Capital to Advance 5G Plans and
Enhance Next-Generation Connectivity for U.S.
Infrastructure
Oct. 23, 2020
Ligado Networks has
successfully raised nearly $4 billion in new
capital, taking a major step toward realizing
the company's 5G plans for mission-critical
industries and expediting the Federal
Communications Commission's (FCC) efforts to
increase the country's use of mid-band spectrum
for next-generation services.
Led by JPMorgan Chase &
Co., Ligado secured $3.85 billion from existing
and new investors, which will support the
company's technology plan to expand the roster
of vendors supporting the L-Band ecosystem.
Since its bipartisan,
unanimous approval from the FCC in April 2020,
Ligado has made important strides to realize the
full potential of its spectrum and progress
toward bringing next-generation services to
market. In June 2020, Ligado's submissions into
3GPP – the industry forum that adopts technical
specifications for terrestrial spectrum – were
approved and, importantly, enjoyed the support
of global vendors such as Nokia, Intel, Samsung,
and Sequans. This capital raise will further
strengthen the company's commercial
collaboration with chipset designers, device
manufacturers, and network infrastructure
providers.
"Today is a great day, and
now the fun begins. We've secured our license,
we've raised the necessary capital, and we're in
a great position to work with the industry to
get this spectrum deployed for 5G to support
critical industries across the U.S.," said Doug
Smith, Ligado President and CEO.
This key milestone enables
the company to focus on developing strategic and
industry partnerships and enhancing our
satellite service capabilities to include IoT
technology. It also allows the company to
advance the development of an innovative private
network solution that will offer enterprise and
industrial sectors the best of both worlds:
managed network services run on fully licensed,
dedicated spectrum.
"This new round of funding
from existing and new investors validates our 5G
plans to deploy this spectrum," said Ivan
Seidenberg, Chairman of Ligado's Board of
Directors. "We look forward to making continued
progress to build the commercial ecosystem and
fully execute on our vision for this spectrum as
authorized by the FCC."