NextWave Redux

In a landmark 2003 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Bankruptcy Code’s anti-discrimination provisions prohibited the Federal Communications Commission ("FCC") from revoking broadband spectrum licenses valued at nearly $5 billion awarded at a pre-bankruptcy auction to chapter 11 debtor NextWave Personal Communications, Inc. based upon its failure to make timely payments to the FCC for the purchase of the licenses. The decision put an end to protracted litigation that had for many years limited access to the disputed broadband capacity, and was widely perceived as having given the green light to technology developers eager to exploit the public airways by removing the shroud of controversy from licenses covering a significant percentage of the available electromagnetic spectrum.