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Faced with spending billions to build national networks quickly, many large wireless communications companies are spinning off assets into new companies to get the job done faster.
Those new affiliates, as they are called, are taking advantage of the hot demand for wireless companies to become publicly traded.
Craig McCaws Nextel Communications Inc. is the latest to join the party. McCaw, who controls the Reston, Va.based wireless dispatch company, formed Nextel Partners Inc. a little more than a year ago. He installed former lieutenants from the early McCaw Communications days, sold the affiliate several Nextel licenses and helped the new Kirkland-based company raise $989.4 million in debt and equity last year.
Now Nextel Partners plans to raise $376.5 million in an initial public offering, which will be the largest public offering ever - in absolute dollars - in the state of Washington. McCaw Cellular Communication's 1987 initial public offering of $285 million currently holds that honor.
By creating Nextel Partners, Nextel Communications is following in the footsteps of AT&T Wireless Services, which has at least three affiliates - TeleCorp PCS Inc., Triton PCS Holdings Inc. and Tritel Inc. - and Sprint PCS, which created affiliate AirGate PCS...