Google to bid for U.S. airwaves if condition added

By Peter Kaplan and Sinead Carew

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Google Inc said on Friday it would take part in a major auction of wireless spectrum airwaves, meeting a minimum required bid of $4.6 billion, if U.S. regulators added a sale condition that Google said would promote an open wireless market.

The prospect of Google's participation in the auction escalates the debate over how the valuable airwaves should be used.

Ten days after Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin floated a proposed set of rules for the auction, Google said it wants the FCC to require the winning bidder to offer to resell access to some of the airwaves to competitors on a wholesale basis.

"When Americans can use the software and handsets of their choice, over open and competitive networks, they win," Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt said in a letter to Martin.

Martin's plan would require support for any wireless device or software application, but it did not include the so-called "wholesale" requirement.

"While these all are positive steps, unfortunately the current draft order falls short of including (all of the) tailored and enforceable conditions, with meaningful implementation deadlines, that consumer groups, other companies, and Google have sought," Schmidt wrote.

Google also called for another provision which would require other companies to be allowed to interconnect "at any technically feasible point" with the winning bidder's network.

Schmidt has said an open telecommunications network drives Internet usage and directly benefits Google's business strategy of selling advertising over the Internet. Some analysts have also speculated that Google could have plans to develop and sell mobile devices.