Telcordia Not Neutral, Should Be Barred from LNPA Job, Neustar Says
Telcordia can’t be the new local number portability administrator, because rules bar equipment manufacturers and their affiliates from filling the position, Neustar told FCC Wireline Bureau officials Friday. That’s meritless, responded Telcordia’s lawyer. It’s Neustar’s latest argument in a monthslong quest to slow down the LNPA vendor selection process, as it lobbies the agency for a new round of bids, or at least a round of comments on the proposed vendor before the FCC approves the choice. The North American Numbering Council (NANC) submitted its sealed recommendation to the Wireline Bureau late last month (CD April 28 p16).
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
"Ericsson is barred by rule,” Neustar said of Telcordia’s parent. A 1997 working group report said any entity with a “direct material financial interest in manufacturing telecommunications network equipment,” would be disqualified from serving as the LNPA, Neustar said (http://bit.ly/1iY8SBV). “The Commission’s incorporation by reference of the 1997 [Selection Working Group] Report thus incorporates the prohibition,” it said. Deviation from that rule would require notice-and-comment rulemaking, it said. Request for proposal documents didn’t include any review of potential bidders’ neutrality showing, Neustar said. “The Commission must design a process to ensure that interested parties have adequate information to comment meaningfully on potential vendors’ compliance with existing neutrality obligations."
"Neustar’s argument is meritless and quotes a 17-year old document out of context,” responded Telcordia counsel John Nakahata of Wiltshire Grannis. “Telcordia is and will be neutral.” Neustar hadn’t made the argument previously “because it is inextricably tied into the neutrality requirement,” and neutrality was not part of earlier deliberations, said a Neustar spokeswoman. “This is the moment to have brought it up. So we did.”
Wireline Bureau officials invited Neustar and Telcordia to the agency to discuss “process” issues last week, such as whether to seek an additional round of comments on the LNPA selection, industry officials said. Neustar and Telcordia weren’t informed what was in the NANC report, officials said. “There is no reason to deviate from the Commission-ordered selection process,” Telcordia said in an ex parte filing detailing the April 30 meeting. The commission has “no legal obligation” to put NANC’s recommendation out for public notice and comment “because the selection of the next LNPA is an informal adjudication, and there is no such thing as a mandatory notice-and-comment informal adjudication,” Telcordia said.
Neustar also railed against the lack of transparency in the LNPA vendor selection process, and urged the commission to make the entire record available. That will let telcos “determine how any proposed technical solution will affect their operations and to evaluate the cost impact of the proposed transition, among other matters,” Neustar said. It said the request for proposals “and technical requirements document do not permit such an evaluation: just as two building contractors might propose to meet a set of specifications in substantially different ways, responsive proposals presumably differ substantially. Carriers and other interested stakeholders must be afforded the opportunity to assess those differences.”
The vendor selection process has been shrouded in secrecy and nondisclosure agreements. A March NANC meeting at the FCC to select the new vendor was not open to the public. NANC last month said it has responded to “all claims of potential unfairness,” and documented “irregularities” it had found, but asked the FCC to exempt the contents of NANC’s communications and reports from all Freedom of Information Act requests. In response to a 2013 Communications Daily FOIA request, the FCC declined to release the documents and correspondence it had exchanged with NANC regarding the LNPA selection process, saying such documents were exempt from FOIA disclosure requirements.
A proposed timeline listed May 6 as the date by which the FCC was expected to approve the LNPA vendor selection, but the timeline can be modified, an agency spokesman said. When the decision is made public it will be in the form of an order posted on the agency’s website, the spokesman said.