Clearwire Shares Jump as Startup Raises Capital

TechFlash reports: A billion or so here, a billion or so there. That appears to be the fundraising pattern at Clearwire, the fast-growing (and money-losing) broadband wireless company which announced late Tuesday that it has raised $920 million in debt financing.

The new money—raised through a Clearwire subsidiary operating under the name Clearwire Escrow Corp.—followed a $1.5 billion fundraising effort which was announced just two weeks ago. That deal included money from Sprint Nextel Corporation, Comcast Corporation, Time Warner Cable, Intel, Eagle River Holdings, and Bright House Networks.

“Today, we are proud to have secured an additional $920 million in debt financing, which, when coupled with the $1.56 billion of recently announced equity financing and the $1.85 billion of debt financing that we closed on today, demonstrates our ability to access the capital markets on attractive terms and in sufficient size to meet our needs, while at the same time prudently balancing equity dilution with the cost of capital,” said Bill Morrow, CEO of Clearwire. “With this latest tranche of additional funding, we have not only exceeded the amount of capital that we have previously stated we needed to fully fund our business plan, but we have also secured additional capital that will allow us to expand more aggressively by covering more people and with more capacity than we had previously planned.”

Shares of Clearwire were up 4 percent on the news.

Clearwire—which plans to begin offering its 4G service in Seattle early next month—currently sells it WiMax service in 24 markets. Founded by wireless pioneer Craig McCaw, Clearwire now boasts 550,000 subscribers.