Sprint's Bowing Out of Incentive Auction Should Teach Regulators a Lesson, FSF Says
Sprint’s decision to sit out the TV incentive auction, after lobbying hard for a spectrum reserve, teaches a valuable lesson, Free State Foundation President Randolph May said Wednesday in a blog post. “The foremost lesson is one I have tried…
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to hammer home for many years,” May wrote. “Absent a true market failure -- and there is not one with respect to the marketplace for broadband services, including wireless services, the Commission needs to quit trying to manage competition.” May’s comments miss the point of Sprint’s advocacy, Larry Krevor, vice president-legal and government affairs-spectrum, said in an email. “Yes, Sprint supported strengthening the spectrum reserve, along with virtually the entire wireless communications industry, other than Verizon and AT&T,” he said. But the record makes clear Sprint’s focus was on persuading the FCC to minimize the “impairment” 600 MHz winners would suffer from remaining TV broadcast operations, Krevor said. “Sprint’s efforts helped the Commission improve the quality of the auctioned spectrum, thereby producing better spectrum for all auction participants to bid on and higher auction revenues.”