- Crown Castle says Dish Wireless defaulted on more than $3.5 billion in unpaid 5G network obligations
- Like other vendors, Crown Castle supports AT&T and SpaceX acquiring Dish’s spectrum, but they want Dish to be held accountable
- Dish may find it hard to work with other vendors in the future, particularly on speculative projects, says an analyst
Crown Castle threw another curveball in the ongoing legal battle with EchoStar subsidiary Dish Wireless, saying Dish still owes it more than $3.5 billion for services rendered as part of its 5G network build.
Crown Castle was the second tower company, after American Tower, to file suit against Dish last year after Dish made clear it wouldn't pay for work related to the 5G network, claiming the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) forced it into spectrum sales totaling $40 billion.
Besides calling the spectrum license sales a “force majeure” event, Dish claims the operation of the 5G network was the entire reason for its agreements with tower and other vendors, and that the purpose was frustrated when the FCC required EchoStar to sell spectrum or face “imminent” license forfeiture.
Crown Castle and other vendors say that’s a bunch of malarkey, as EchoStar made the voluntary decision to sell its 3.45 GHz and 600 MHz spectrum to AT&T and AWS-4, H-block and unpaired AWS-3 spectrum to SpaceX. Combined, those deals will put more than $40 billion into EchoStar’s coffers.
According to Crown Castle, which had contracted with Dish to provide space on 20,000 of its towers, Dish initially continued to make its required payments but recently failed to do so, defaulting on its obligations to the tune of $3.5 billion. Subsequently, Crown officially terminated its wireless infrastructure agreement with Dish.
“Dish is refusing to pay the American workers and businesses it used to build its network and meet the minimum FCC coverage requirements necessary to retain its spectrum licenses – an American public resource. Now those same spectrum licenses are being sold for more than $40 billion,” Crown Castle said in a January 12 statement.
Asked for comment, a Dish spokesperson provided the following statement: “Crown Castle initiated litigation against Dish Wireless on November 20, 2025, and we cannot comment due to the litigation.”
That jibes with what EchoStar CEO and Chairman Charlie Ergen said when asked about the tower companies during EchoStar’s Q3 earnings call in November. Ergen said the American Tower lawsuit soured discussions because once litigation begins, “it’s lawyers talking to lawyers and it’s not business people talking to business people. And so that’s a bit unfortunate.”
Crown has a lot of company
Crown Castle is not alone in its disdain for the way this is all going down. Crown and other vendors say they support AT&T and SpaceX obtaining the spectrum licenses from Dish, but they want Dish to be held accountable.
Last month, the Wireless Infrastructure Association (WIA) sent a letter to the FCC calling for conditions to the AT&T and SpaceX spectrum transfer agreements so that EchoStar isn’t allowed to “unjustly enrich itself” at the expense of infrastructure companies, fiber backhaul providers and construction firms that built its network.
EchoStar/Dish has argued that the deals with its vendors are private and that the FCC shouldn’t get involved.
Overall, the events set a bad precedent for Dish and will likely harm that company's ability to work with vendors in the future, especially on speculative projects, said Daryl Schoolar, analyst at Recon Analytics.
Schoolar said he doubts the FCC will get involved. “I imagine they want the deals to go through to AT&T and SpaceX, so I’d be surprised if they make that a condition of the sale,” he told Fierce. “It’s a bad deal for the vendors.”