The FCC released guidance for mobile wireless ISPs, governmental entities and third parties using their own hardware and software to submit speed test data for the broadband data collection data process Friday. Governmental and third-party entities using their own hardware or software must submit "a complete description of the methodology used to collect their data and substantiate it through the certification of a qualified engineer or official," said a Broadband Data Task Force, Wireless Bureau, Office of Economics and Analytics, and Office of Engineering and Technology Office public notice in docket 19-195. Providers must also include test methodology and metrics that OET-approved apps will need for challenges if using their own equipment to collect data. The notice also provided guidance on formatting and submitting data.

The deployment of 6G by 2029 and its “widespread commercialization” by 2032 will require heavy investment in “distributed computing” and AI, reported ABI Research Thursday. As 5G’s commercial rollout continues, the deployment of distributed computing has become progressively more important, it said. Distributed computing, also called “edge-to-cloud” compute, is the use of “disaggregated resources to perform compute operations,” it said. In the 5G era, distributed computing has played a “supportive” role, but as service providers transition to 6G, distributed computing will be given a “leading” role, it said.

Verizon has deployed C band to cover 150 million POPs, headed to 175 million by year-end, CEO Hans Vestberg said at a Goldman Sachs conference Wednesday. “We have 161 MHz [of spectrum] nationwide,” he said: “We're so far using 60 MHz. We're getting into 100 MHz.” Vestberg also warned that churn is elevated this quarter because of price increases for the company’s wireless offerings. “We said it in the second quarter with the price increases, we are going to get the churn bubble in the third quarter on the consumer side, because that's how it works,” he said. Verizon will also have negative net adds in Q3, “but clearly we will have an improvement" over Q2, he said. In July, Verizon reported postpaid phone net adds of just 12,000 Q2, with 215,000 net losses on the consumer side (see 2207220061).

T-Mobile hopes to launch satellite-to-cellular service, working with SpaceX (see 2208260038), late next year, starting with the ability of customers to send and receive messages from remote locations, CEO Mike Sievert said at a Goldman Sachs conference Wednesday. Sievert said it isn't clear when the FCC will OK the plan, but “what gives me confidence here is that the FCC has been very clear that one of the priorities that they have is making sure that reliable connections are available everywhere.” T-Mobile hopes to start with “a beta centered around a messaging service, not just texting, but messaging apps as well with real-time back and forth ability to send messages, send pictures that kind of thing,” he said. “We've been working on this for a long time and it could really change things,” he said: “This is a vast country and it has, millions of places, hundreds of thousands of square miles, where there's no signal from any cellular company.” T-Mobile has largely wrapped up the decommissioning of the Sprint network, more than a year ahead of schedule, Sievert said. Sprint spectrum is being converted to T-Mobile 5G, he said. Parts of switching over Sprint’s back office operations remain to be completed, he said. “The main thing that's left now is billing and our intention is to make that opaque to the customer,” Sievert said. “We move Sprint customer billing over to the T-Mobile systems [and] their rate plan doesn't change, the look and feel of their bill doesn't really change.” Sievert said T-Mobile is sticking with its strategy of not raising prices despite inflation. “We don't raise prices because it's not our strategy and our strategy is something that we're confident in,” he said. Sievert noted Verizon and AT&T are also deploying mid-band spectrum for 5G: “They're scrambling to catch up, but we're moving at pace as well, even faster.”

All Corning businesses are “continuing to perform well” in the current quarter, “in line” with expectations, except for display technologies, Executive Vice President-Chief Strategy Officer Jeff Evenson told a Goldman Sachs investor conference Tuesday. Panel maker output declined in August “from already low levels” due to “rolling power outages” in China, he said. “This reduces our outlook for display glass volume in the quarter,” he said. “Consequently, we now anticipate the third quarter coming in at the bottom or slightly below” the guidance Corning gave July 26 when it said display glass volume would decline by a mid-teen percentage sequentially from Q2, he said. Corning thinks the outlook for the display market is positive over the “medium and long term,” said Evenson. “As people are doing more things at home, as they're looking to upgrade to better entertainment experiences, the use of larger, more lifelike displays, we think, will continue to be a priority.” The COVID-19 pandemic “induced a lot of advanced purchases, probably accelerated those trends, and pushed us up above the normal range of large TV units,” which customarily number between 225 million and 235 million sets a year, he said. Corning’s view is that TV unit sales for 2022 will be “in the vicinity of what they were last year” but “could be a little down,” he said. Optical communications was Corning’s “biggest growth driver” in Q2, rising 10% sequentially and 22% year over year to $1.3 billion, said Evenson. The world has installed enough glass “to go to the sun and back about 20 times” since Corning invented “low-loss optical fiber” in 1970, he said. Yet only about 19% of Americans “connect through fiber in their homes,” he said. “We believe that the industry is at the beginning of a large multiyear wave of growth.” The combination of private network and public infrastructure investments “will create double-digit market growth for passive optics over the next few years,” he said.

RS Access representatives met with staff for Commissioner Nathan Simington to make the case that 5G can be safely deployed in 12 GHz. “We explained that RS Access has now submitted two in-depth technical Monte Carlo analyses demonstrating the feasibility of coexistence even as the [satellite] licensees that oppose more intensive use of the 12.2-12.7 GHz band have submitted no studies of their own,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 20-443. “Even after accounting for Starlink’s preferred modeling assumptions, however dubious” an RKF Engineering study found “that 5G operations would have no effect on at least 99.85% of [non-geostationary] operations in the 12 GHz band,” RS Access said.

The National Emergency Management Association filed in support of the FirstNet Authority's application to renew its Band 14 license for the nationwide public safety broadband network for another 10 years. The network “provides critical wireless communications services, features, and tools to public safety responders across the country to assist with their life-saving missions,” the group said in a universal licensing system filing: “We are impressed by the FirstNet Authority’s rapid progress in deploying Band 14 nationwide on the NPSBN and bringing over 3.7 million connections onto the network in less than five years.” FirstNet is being used “by many of NEMA’s member agencies and first responders across the country, and we urge the Commission to swiftly renew FirstNet’s Band 14 license.” Other groups have raised concerns (see 2209070059).

The FCC Wireless Bureau Wednesday approved a license modification to allow Amtrak to offer positive train control on a line extending from New Haven to Springfield, Massachusetts. The bureau OK’d a modification of an automated maritime telecommunications system being used for PTC. Amtrak has operated the nine base stations involved since 2018 under a grant of special temporary Authority, the bureau said.

Amazon spoke with aides to FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and Commissioners Brendan Carr and Nathan Simington on the use of the 60 GHz band by drones. Amazon discussed “how the unique characteristics of innovative 60 GHz radar technologies would enhance the safety of drone operations in the U.S. and promote the public interest,” said a filing posted Tuesday in docket 21-264. Amazon supports “authorizing the use of unlicensed field disturbance sensor devices onboard drones in the 60 GHz band,” which would “enhance the drone’s ability to sense and avoid persons and obstacles in and near its ascent and descent path, thereby improving aviation safety.”

AT&T’s gains in wireless customers, 3 million postpaid added in the last year, aren’t based just on promotions, CEO John Stankey said at a Goldman Sachs conference Monday. “There are a lot of things working well,” he said: “We are actually gaining customers in a lot of different places and a lot of different ways, and there isn't any single answer to it, and I know folks want to continue to go back and say, ‘well, it's a high level of promotion that's doing it.’ And that's actually not correct.” Stankey noted the gains AT&T has made in the public safety market as a result of FirstNet. “That's not based on promotion,” he said. Stankey conceded that AT&T was later than its peers to deploy mid-band spectrum for 5G. “It is now up and starting to make its appearance -- in metropolitan areas, the performance we're getting out of it is really, really good,” he said. “That will be a big lift on what is already a strong network," he said.