New bidder lifts auction

By PAULA OLIVER

A new bidder who yesterday raised the spirits of the Government's radio spectrum auction has refused to reveal his reason for entering the auction.

Stuart Beadle, registered under the company name Northelia, made two bids for second-generation (2G) spectrum totalling $110,000.

He is involved with commercial cleaning franchise CleanTastic, which is planning to expand internationally from its base in Auckland.

Mr Beadle, who is involved in two other companies, also holds the registration for the internet website adultstore.co.nz.

He said yesterday that he had been spending a bit of time in Australia, but returned to New Zealand 18 months ago.

His present business interests were more in the franchise arena than telecommunications, but he was interested in opportunities.

Mr Beadle said the adultstore.co.nz website was not yet running.

It would offer upmarket, million-dollar products, using an American concept.

"It's kind of the Big Boys' Toys concept.

"But it has nothing to do with the spectrum bidding, which I'll talk about a bit more in the future."

Bidding in the auction has rebounded over the past few days, after a tumultuous phase that saw $68 million sliced off the total value of bids in one day.

At the close yesterday, bids totalled $117 million, still short of their highest level of $138 million.

The Ministry of Economic Development is this week evaluating feedback from bidders on a number of proposed rules changes that it hopes will bring the long-running auction to an end.

Proposals range from increasing the number of rounds per day, to ending the auction after just one round clear of bidding. The changes that gain the most support from bidders could be introduced this week.