Dish Network threw in the towel on its attempt to acquire
WiMax pioneer Clearwire, officially withdrawing its tender offer for the company
Wednesday.
In a terse statement, Dish said it was withdrawing its offer
"as a result of the recent change in recommendation by Clearwire."
Dish had offered
to pay Clearwire shareholders $3.30 per share for their stock in January, a
move that seemed to trump Sprint
Nextel's $2.97 per share offer for the remaining 49% in the WiMax pioneer
it didn't already own. Sprint
upped the ante to $3.40 per share in May, followed later that month by Dish's
$4.40 per share tender offer. On June 20, Sprint
raised the bar again to $5 per share. Also on that date, a special
committee of Clearwire's board of directors recommended shareholders accept the
Sprint offer.
This makes Dish zero-for-two in its recent
M&A dealings with Sprint. The satellite giant dropped
its $25.5 billion bid for a 100% interest in the wireless carrier on June
18, after a revised bid from SoftBank. The loss of Clearwire now brings into
question what Dish and chairman Charlie Ergen will do with its wireless
spectrum. Reports have speculated that Dish could focus its attention on
pursuing a merger with the nation's largest satellite TV service provider
DirecTV, or on acquiring another wireless company like T-Mobile.
