EchoStar/Dish raises doubts about 'ability to continue as a going concern'

[telstar_1]

And more info-

“Because we do not currently have committed financing to fund our operations for at least twelve months … substantial doubt exists about our ability to continue as a going concern,” EchoStar said in the 10-Q. “We do not currently have the necessary cash on hand and/or projected future cash flows to fund fourth quarter operations or the November 2024 debt maturity.”

This part tell me they have given up on a investor and begging those who hold the debt-

CEO Hamid Akhavan said the company is working on a number of avenues to refinance its obligations and improve its cash position. “We have fielded a variety of offers and are pursuing those which can support our long term objectives,” he told investors on May 8. “The complex and delicate nature of this process demands time and confidentiality. We will certainly have more to share in due course.”

“Candidly, can we push the maturities out? We’re very bullish about our prospects of our operating business if we have the capital to execute,” Akhavan said. “While we’re working on that financing, we’re not sitting on our hands and letting opportunities expire. We continue to develop them, so hopefully post-challenges on financing, we will have a good business to go forward.”

Akhavan told investors that he sees significant asset value on the balance sheet, relative to the company’s liabilities. He estimated that company’s spectrum ownership is worth “far more than the value of the obligations we have.” He said EchoStar is working to capitalize on the value of its asset to debt and turn it into liquidity to execute the company’s business.

The problem with the above is Dish/Echostar cannot do anything till 2026 and they need someone they will want what they are offering.

Telecommunications analyst Craig Moffett said in a research note on Wednesday that filing for bankruptcy in the next four to six months is now “the most likely outcome” for EchoStar.

And while EchoStar’s spectrum is “enormously valuable,” Moffett said that likely buyers AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile do not look to be in a position to spend aggressively on new spectrum. Moffett noted that both AT&T and Verizon have investment grade credit ratings, but have debt-to-EBITDA leverage ratios that are above investment grade guidelines. Both have also teased share repurchases.

“The intrinsic value of Dish’s assets in a bankruptcy liquidation is inarguably very high. Whether they could fetch anything like intrinsic value, however, is less clear,” Moffett wrote. “There are only three potential bidders, two of whom have badly overburdened balance sheets. There is no longer Dish itself as the marginal bidder. And the time value of money is a real consideration; a liquidation would potentially take a very long time. In fact, it’s not even clear that spectrum sales of any size would be allowed.”

EchoStar Continues to Shed Subscribers Amid Cash Crunch, Analyst Predicts Bankruptcy

EchoStar Corporation reported an 8.5% revenue decline in the first quarter of 2024 compared to the prior year, with subscriber declines in pay-TV, retail

www.satellitetoday.com

One mobile co. is spending, and another may be thinking about it.

https://www.wsj.com/business/telecom/t-mobile-verizon-in-talks-to-carve-up-u-s-cellular-46d1e5e6?st=esppn0jf8e6oeh7&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

 

[Juan]

IF DISH doesn't meet the 75% deadline to build out their cell phone company in June of next year they can lose all the spectrum that they have paid for up to now. But they need lots of money to finish the build out of the towers in rural areas, so it all comes back to money. I don't see them meeting the deadline. Maybe a renegotiate with the FCC before the deadline?

It's population not area...they don't put cell towers in corn fields

 

[Bruce]

It's population not area...they don't put cell towers in corn fields

Again, LA, Boston and Charleston are metro areas, Dish still has to get those done, which probably will bring them extremely close to 75%.

 

[Yespage]

It's population not area...they don't put cell towers in corn fields

 

[AZ.]

View attachment 171314

The first thing I thought of was the cell companies lining all the highways with towers.

 

[MikeD-C05]

It's population not area...they don't put cell towers in corn fields

They have said for the last year that the rural areas are what will be a boogaboo, because of covering less dense areas. Less dense and rural are pretty much the same thing. Rural areas are not full of a large population like cities like L.A. California.

"DISH has a deadline of mid-June 2025 to cover 75% of the U.S. population with 5G in areas where it has spectrum. This deadline is more expensive to meet than the 2023 deadline to cover 70% of the population because it will require coverage in LESS DENSE AREAS. Some analysts believe that the 2025 deadline will require an additional 15,000 cell sites and up to $3 Billion to achieve."

 

[Juan]

They have said for the last year that the rural areas are what will be a boogaboo, because of covering less dense areas. Less dense and rural are pretty much the same thing. Rural areas are not full of a large population like cities like L.A. California.

"DISH has a deadline of mid-June 2025 to cover 75% of the U.S. population with 5G in areas where it has spectrum. This deadline is more expensive to meet than the 2023 deadline to cover 70% of the population because it will require coverage in LESS DENSE AREAS. Some analysts believe that the 2025 deadline will require an additional 15,000 cell sites and up to $3 Billion to achieve."

I believe they are above 70% now...it all depends what the FCC calls rural and also coverage just means the service is available...they don't measure how many people can receive a signal at their particular location...if you live in timbucktoo..dish only needs 1 tower and they have service...not 7 towers to cover 50 people

 

[Juan]

View attachment 171314

There is a highway nearby...

 

[Bruce]

I believe they are above 70% now...it all depends what the FCC calls rural

Quit trying to start another Rabbit Hole discussion, the FCC never required them to be in a rural areas, they required 75% of the United States, since they are still not in LA, Boston and Charleston , the biggest of those, LA Metro, has a population of 18 Million and 33,954 square miles, making it the largest metropolitan region in the United States by land area.

Fill those 3 areas in, which probably has the towers already up, so they just need to add the equipment to, would probably get them to the 75%.

 

[MikeD-C05]

I believe they are above 70% now...it all depends what the FCC calls rural

Typically , urban areas have high density buildings , while suburban and RURAL areas have low density housing. Low density housing typically refers to residential areas occupied by single-family homes or buildings with a small number of units. Low density neighborhoods are generally more sparsely populated, mainly made up of free-standing houses. A low population density refers to an area with a small number of people relative to the size of the land. It indicates that there are fewer individuals living in a given space.

I can go on, but it pretty much means what I said when you look up the real estate terms from Century 21. Now from the FCC-04-166A1.document : Rural as territory, population and housing units not classified as urban. The FCC defines rural areas as counties with a population density of 100 people per square mile or less for the purposes of wireless spectrum policies.

 

[Yespage]

Of course, if Dish isn't going to make money with their 5G system, it doesn't matter if they've deployed their service to 105% of the US population.

There is a highway nearby...

Admittedly, I just made this one up.

 

[nelson61]

Reaching 75 percent is a minor problem
Rolling or offloading the billions in debt due this year is THE problem.

 

[Yespage]

Reaching 75 percent is a minor problem
Rolling or offloading the billions in debt due this year is THE problem.

I think the no revenue from this investment could be a bigger issue. I mean, yeah, the debt is bad, but if you have revenue, you generally get more options for rolling the debt. Dish's SEC filing stopped just short of saying they were going to need to talk to "Tony at the corner" about a loan.

If I'm reading things right, they said their 5G commercialization made them $29.5 million in the first quarter... operations were about 20 times that.

 

[Juan]

Of course, if Dish isn't going to make money with their 5G system, it doesn't matter if they've deployed their service to 105% of the US population.


View attachment 171315

Admittedly, I just made this one up.

Looks like something in Ohio

 

[Juan]

Typically , urban areas have high density buildings , while suburban and RURAL areas have low density housing. Low density housing typically refers to residential areas occupied by single-family homes or buildings with a small number of units. Low density neighborhoods are generally more sparsely populated, mainly made up of free-standing houses. A low population density refers to an area with a small number of people relative to the size of the land. It indicates that there are fewer individuals living in a given space.

I can go on, but it pretty much means what I said when you look up the real estate terms from Century 21. Now from the FCC-04-166A1.document : Rural as territory, population and housing units not classified as urban. The FCC defines rural areas as counties with a population density of 100 people per square mile or less for the purposes of wireless spectrum policies.

Rural areas have more powerful cell towers than urban...the reason is a cell tower biggest limitation is number of users..so in a urban area you have smaller cells with directional antennas to serve pockets of dense population..rural you have 1 tower with omnidirectional antennas to serve a much larger area because nobody uses it as much.....different ways of doing 5g

 

[telstar_1]

Do farmers need 5g?

 

[tjboston5676]

Do farmers need 5g?

Yes.

Most farm areas (atleast where I live) don't even have cell service period. They literally have to have a landline phone or drive 5-10 miles just to make a phone call.

 

[syphix]

Do farmers need 5g?

You’d be surprised how tech advanced many farms are.

 

[nelson61]

You’d be surprised how tech advanced many farms are.

I was talking to a farmer at coffee a couple weeks ago.
He contract raises young milk cows for the big milk farms.

he was checking the status of each of his cows on his phone as we talked (several thousand miles from his operations). Each cow has a sensor inplant that generates continous health reports.
They have special flooring for comfort, a certain type of elevator music they like, and lots of other stuff>

Said he runs a multimillion dollar business and would not survive without the digital connection.

 

[Juan]

Do farmers need 5g?

For the robots that are going to harvest the crops...get with program