We analyze the prioritized sharing between an added value Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) and multiple Mobile Network Operators (MNOs). An added value MVNO is one which earns added revenue from wireless users in addition to the revenue it directly collects for providing them wireless service. To offer service, an MVNO needs to contract with one or more MNOs to utilize their networks. Agreeing on such a contract requires the MNOs to consider the impact on their revenue from allowing the MVNO to enter the market as well as the possibility that other MNOs will cooperate. To further protect their customers, the MNOs may prioritize their direct customers over those of the MVNO. We establish a multi-stage game to analyze the equilibrium decisions of the MVNO, MNOs, and users in such a setting. In particular, we characterize the condition under which the MVNO can collaborate with the MNOs. The results show that the MVNO tends to cooperate with the MNOs when the band resources are limited and the added value is significant. When there is significant difference in band resources among the MNOs, the MVNO first considers cooperating with the MNO with a smaller band. We also consider the case when the users also have access to unlicensed spectrum.

There has been much interest in expanding the amount of unlicensed spectrum available for wireless services. Such spectrum reduces the barriers to entry by removing the need to purchase expensive licenses and so may lead to increased competition. However, this spectrum also has the risk of becoming over-congested, which could deter service providers from investing and offering service. Recent work has studied this trade-off by considering game theoretic models where service providers first make decisions to invest and then subsequently compete for customers. In such cases, the only Nash equilibria are often for a single service provider to enter and act as a monopolist. These conclusions are based on a model where service providers simultaneously make investment decisions with full knowledge about their competitors' costs. Here, we relax these assumptions and consider more realistic scenarios where service providers make investment decisions at different times and also consider cases where these decisions are made with incomplete information about the other service provider's costs. For a class of such games, we characterize the resulting Nash equilibria and show that differences in timing and uncertainty lead to a richer class of possible equilibria.