For years, Dish Network has collected spectrum as rumors circulated about the company possibly entering the wireless game. Today another one of those reports has surfaced.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and Dish CEO Charlie Ergan have become friends over the past year or so and have talked about forming a partnership to enter the wireless business, according to sources speaking to the Wall Street Journal. Some of the ideas that are allegedly floating around include Amazon helping to finance Dish’s network that’d focus on the Internet of Things and that Amazon could offer Prime members a monthly phone plan for a little extra on top of their Prime subscription.
No Amazon-Dish deal is close, the sources of today’s report caution, and it’s not clear if the two companies’ talks of a wireless partnership will even progress any farther.
A wireless partnership between Amazon and Dish would be interesting. As I said before, Dish has spectrum that could be used for an entry into wireless, and the company even tried to acquire Sprint. And then there's Amazon, which has the deep pockets that’d be useful in getting a new wireless business get off the ground, and Amazon has shown interest in the mobile game in the past with its failed Fire Phone. Now we just have to wait and see if Amazon and Dish actually decide to combine their resources to break into the wireless game.