The sale, which also has the approval of TerreStar’s creditors, was the result of a bankruptcy auction held in June to end TerreStar’s nine-month Chapter 11 protection period and resolve the company’s $1 billion of debt. Dish Network’s minimum bid for TerreStar received no rival counter bids.

   Analysts were surprised at the auctions outcome, with many firms expecting Dish Network to compete with a group of TerreStar’s senior debt holders and wireless operator MetroPCS Communications through the auction’s June 27 bid deadline. Competing offers for TerreStar were required to be at least $55.5 million higher than Dish Network’s offer.

   Zacks Investment Research issued a report July 8 speculating the impact of Dish Network’s aggressive campaign to acquire TerreStar spectrum — 20MHz of the 2.0GHz band — with the contiguous 20MHz of 2.0GHz spectrum it inherited when it purchased bankrupt hybrid S-band service provider DBSD North America in March.

   “The acquisition of DBSD provides Dish Network an extremely valuable spectrum for both wireless and wireline communications. Additionally, Dish Network itself owns a slot of highly demanded 700 MHz wireless frequency, which is generally used for 4G LTE network.Using these slots of airwaves, the company can form a formidable video-on-demand service over a wireless network of mobile handsets such as smartphones and tablets,” the firm said in the report.

   Dish Network will provide $325 million more to DBSD’s parent company, Ico Global Communications – soon to be re-branded to Pendrell Corp. – and remain committed to DBSD for another $87.5 million as debtor-in-possession credit facility. Dish Network also bought Blockbuster on April 7 for about $320 million, with $228 million of the purchase made in cash. A U.S. bankruptcy court approved the auction the same day. Dish Network said it purchased Blockbuster primarily for its video-on-demand service to complement Dish Network’s own satellite-TV offering but will use the Blockbuster locations to cross-sell its satellite services.

   “We believe Dish Network is trying hard to be the storage medium for the valuable wireless spectrum that can be used to grow a viable pay-TV distribution network or can transform the company to a wireless service provider. TerreStar owns around 20 MHz of wireless spectrum and is currently working on a project to launch world’s first satellite smartphone,” Zacks analysts said.