FCC Unanimously Approves IP Transition Trial Proposal Framework

Chairman Tom Wheeler called it a “really significant” and “important moment” for the industry and the commission. Commissioner Ajit Pai, the first commissioner to publicly endorse the idea of IP trials (CD March 8 p4), quoted Albert Einstein: A “pretty experiment is in itself often more valuable than twenty formulae extracted from our minds.” The industry can’t just turn off the public-switched telephone network overnight, Pai said. “We need to beta test the concept first.” AT&T Senior Vice President-Federal Regulatory Bob Quinn stood smiling at the back of the packed commission meeting room Thursday as agency staff spoke of the benefits trials could bring to the industry.

The text of the order hadn’t been released, but Pai’s statement (http://fcc.us/1eAWgZP) quoted several sentences he said are consistent with principles he set forth in 2013. “No provider will be forced to participate in an experiment,” the order said in his recounting. The trials will “seek experiments that cover areas with different population densities and demographics, different topologies, and/or different seasonal and meteorological conditions,” he recounted it said. Pai said it stated that no consumer will lose “access to service or critical functionalities,” and residential and business customers must receive “clear, timely, and sufficient notice of any service-based experiment.” The order seeks “experiments that collect and provide to the commission data on key attributes of IP-based services,” which will help the commission evaluate the trial with empirical data, Pai said.

As expected, the proposal identifies mandatory conditions for any trial -- like 911 functioning properly, or continued access for persons with disabilities -- as well as rebuttable presumptions that might be waived. Presumptions are concepts that are “very important to the core values” that applications “almost certainly” would need to show to get approval, but if there’s a “strong showing that it’s in the public interest,” trials might proceed without meeting those presumptions, said Wireline Bureau Chief Julie Veach. One example of a rebuttable presumption she gave was the requirement that intercarrier compensation payments continue to be made.

Commissioner Mike O'Rielly said he approves a “vast majority” of the item. He’s glad the order makes clear that trials will not interfere with natural conversion to IP occurring outside the trials. Nor will trial results be binding on what’s happening outside the trials, or on future decisions, he said. The order also has a one-year sunset date to ensure the tests will be “timely and relevant,” he said. O'Rielly took issue with the conditions and presumptions, which he called “numerous and complex and not what I would have written if I had the pen.” O'Rielly said he worries that so many conditions might reduce the number of companies that seek to participate.

The trial will consist of three stages, officials have said: In the first stage, companies may seek approval to offer only IP services to new customers in an area. In the second stage, a telco could seek commission approval to transition the remaining legacy TDM customers to the IP services, while keeping the TDM network up as a backup. In the third stage, the companies could seek permission under a Communications Act Section 214 process to shut down their TDM network.

Phone Service Stays

Thursday’s vote doesn’t take away the existing phone service of any consumers, Veach said. “The only thing that the FCC has authorized today is that providers may apply for voluntary trials from the perspective of consumers.” Nor does the item decide legal or policy questions, she said: The trials are about gathering information to inform those legal and policy questions. Keeping some people on TDM services while others are on IP services “provides us the kind of control group comparison that is fundamental to what the commission is trying to achieve,” a Wireline Bureau official told reporters after the meeting.

Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel praised the “sandbox” approach taken by the trials. “Sandbox thinking” -- opening up some areas of a program for experimentation -- is “so popular among startups in Silicon Valley,” she said. “Why not put it to use in Washington? After all, testing big ideas in a small way is a good way to understand the consequences of our policy choices -- and the impact they have on consumers -- before unleashing them in the world at large.” Commissioner Mignon Clyburn noted that March will mark the fourth anniversary of the National Broadband Plan, which set a blueprint for the FCC to update its policies to promote and reflect IP networks. “I am pleased that the order recognizes what I have maintained all along,” she said: “That the core values embodied in the Communications Act ... do not change as technologies evolve and must guide the commission’s process going forward."

In addition to the experiments providing IP-based services as alternatives to legacy services, the item explores experiments to deliver broadband to rural areas, and makes available $3 million for a Telecommunications Relay Service research budget, FCC officials said. Another section of the item examines whether the process for assigning telephone numbers can be simplified, which might dramatically reduce the number of illegal robocalls “that we all enjoy,” said FCC Chief Technology Officer Henning Schulzrinne. Along with standards bodies at the North American Numbering Council, the FCC plans an industry workshop soon to design a “neutral test bed” exploring long-term technology options that make full use of IP technologies, he said.

The commission will also take a broader, comprehensive assessment on how to better collect data on a national scale, Schulzrinne said: “Where are we in the transition? How are the transitions affecting these core values? What matters most” to consumer and industry participants? “What tradeoffs” can they make that are acceptable, he asked. “The commission is at the end of the beginning of its work on IP transitions,” said FCC Acting General Counsel Jonathan Sallet. The bureaus will keep working in parallel as they await submissions and proposals, he said. In the spring, the commission expects to hold a workshop on access to persons with disabilities; a workshop on numbering; and a workshop on expanding rural broadband, he said.