FCC Chairman Kevin Martin late Wednesday began circulating on the 8th floor rules that promote roaming agreements between small and large wireless carriers. The order does not cap prices carriers can charge but does hold that roaming must be offered at just and reasonable rates, sources said. Sources said Martin means the order to deal completely with roaming complaints before the agency.
Howard Buskirk
Howard Buskirk, Executive Senior Editor, joined Warren Communications News in 2004, after covering Capitol Hill for Telecommunications Reports. He has covered Washington since 1993 and was formerly executive editor at Energy Business Watch, editor at Gas Daily and managing editor at Natural Gas Week. Previous to that, he was a staff reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Greenville News. Follow Buskirk on Twitter: @hbuskirk
The National Association of Broadcasters led the charge against a merger of XM and Sirius in comments at the FCC. The 58-page NAB filing called the case for rejecting the merger “simple and straightforward.” Diverse commenters lined for and against the proposed merger, many repeating arguments made at four Congressional hearings and in material already on file at the FCC.
The FCC should revise an April order on telecom carrier use of customer proprietary network information (CPNI) and other customer information (CD April 3 p10), The United States Telecom Association (USTelecom) and CTIA said in separate petitions for reconsideration. USTelecom said the order seems to assume, in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), that carriers are at fault when a pretexter obtains protected information. CTIA took exception to a finding in the order that carriers inadequately protect CPNI.
The Media Access Project (MAP) objected at the FCC to the XM-Sirius merger, predicting more media consolidation if the merger is approved. Comments were due at the FCC Monday and were just starting to trickle in. MAP, which previously had not staked out a position, was joined by Prometheus Radio Project and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.
The New York Police Department wants wireless carriers’ success locating E-911 calls measure by public safety answering point (PSAP), not through statewide averaging as carriers prefer, the department told the FCC. The department cited public safety concerns that the agency usually gives significant weight.
Engineering studies show large areas in rural states where coverage by major wireless carriers is not an option, Alltel said in reply comments in an FCC docket advising the Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service on longterm universal service reform. Meanwhile, AT&T provided updated recommendations on its proposal for a pilot program to pay for rural broadband deployment.
The FCC should adjust any pending automatic roaming rules to go beyond voice to include data, said SouthernLINC Wireless. The carrier, a vigorous advocate of wider roaming responsibilities, filed a paper at the FCC this week based on arguments it made in May meetings with Wireless Bureau staffers.
AT&T’s acquisition of Dobson Cellular likely faces few regulatory hurdles at the FCC or Justice Department, analysts and industry sources agreed Monday. AT&T announced a deal late Friday to buy Dobson for $2.8 billion. Dobson sells service to some 1.7 million customers under the Cellular One brand. Both use GSM-based technology, simplifying system integration. And Dobson has 850 MHz spectrum well-suited to serving rural areas, analysts said. AT&T and Dobsons hope to close the deal this year.
XM and Sirius wrongly claim they will be able to offer interoperable radios to subscribers if their merger is approved, the National Association of Broadcasters said. “The two… systems employ different RF frequencies, bandwidths, transport stream packet structures and, most significantly, different audio codecs,” said the engineering study, funded by NAB and written by Meintel, Sgrignoli, & Wallace. Lack of radios that can receive both satellite signals is among issues before regulators as they weigh the proposed merger (CD Apr 19 p2). It also is a sore point in regard to the XM-Sirius proposal on the Hill,
XM and Sirius compete not only with one other but with “terrestrial radio, pre-recorded music devices, mobile phones, and fixed and mobile internet services,” economist and former FCC Commissioner Harold Furchtgott-Roth said. His new report addresses an issue on which the merger’s fate likely hinges: In terms of assessing market power, is satellite radio a unique market or part of a much larger world?