A Federal Communications Commission report could clear the way for the auction of unused spectrum, a boost for the free nationwide wireless proposal championed by Google, Microsoft, and venture-backed startup M2Z.
The report, released Friday, concluded that the danger of interference “based on reasonable assumptions” would allow the use of the spectrum between television channels.
Three-year-old M2Z, backed by Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield and Byers, Charles River Ventures and Redpoint Ventures, had asked the FCC to grant it spectrum to provide an advertising-supported nationwide wireless network. Google and Microsoft also have stumped to free the spectrum, while T-Mobile, which sells data services to its wireless subscribers, has been lobbying against the plan as a potential source of interference for existing carriers.
The proposal gained momentum in recent months when FCC Chairman Kevin Martin called for selling the unused spectrum to a bidder that would agree to devote one quarter of the bandwidth for free nationwide wireless service.
M2Z was founded by Chairman Milo Medin, co-founder of @Home Networks and a former project manager at NASA, and Chief Executive Officer John Muleta, former chief of the FCC’s wireless telecommunications bureau.
An FCC auction of the bandwidth could begin by 2009.