Vanguard Cellular Systems Inc. is trading its Orange County, N.Y., market to PriCellular Wireless Corp. in return for Ohio properties that Vanguard feels will fit nicely into its West Virginia metro cluster.
“The people in that area [Orange County] have more in common with the other side of the Hudson,” said Stan Haines, Vanguard assistant treasurer. Vanguard didn’t hold the right contiguous markets, so roaming and rate plans were more difficult to manage. “It was a good opportunity for both sides,” Haines said.
Greensboro, N.C.-based Vanguard remains a pure play in the cellular industry. It has not participated in any of the wireless spectrum auctions, saying prices were too high. Instead, the company is concentrating on expanding its clusters and continuing its network buildout. It has about 381,000 subscribers in five clusters: Mid-Atlantic, West Virginia, Florida, the Carolinas and New England.
Vanguard has agreed to give its 100 percent interest in the Orange County metropolitan statistical area to PriCellular, along with certain minority interests in other markets. A definitive agreement is pending.
In return, PriCellular will give Vanguard its 100 percent interest in the Ohio-9 rural service area, a portion of its Ohio-10 RSA (excluding Perry and Hocking counties) and the Parkersburg, W.V./Marietta, Ohio, MSA.
In aggregate, Vanguard will give PriCellular about 324,000 control pops and 71,000 minority pops; Vanguard will receive 542,000 control pops from PriCellular.
Once the deal is closed, Vanguard will be able to serve 1 million pops in the Ohio Valley/West Virginia region, rather than the net 623,946 pops it had previously.
As it forms stronger clusters, Vanguard continues to enhance the system’s infrastructure. Last year, 110 new cell sites were added, and 65 sites were replaced or upgraded, bringing Vanguard’s total number of cells to 270 at the end of the year. Vanguard plans to add 80 new sites this year.
The networks now are digital ready. Vanguard will migrate to Time Division Multiple Access digital technology when capacity constraints require it. Vanguard’s biggest roaming partners, AT&T Wireless Inc. and Southwestern Bell Mobile Systems, also already use or plan to use TDMA technology.
