American Tower agreed to buy data center manager CoreSite for $10.1 billion, the tower company said Monday. It's expected to “create a differentiated, comprehensive and interconnected communications real estate platform optimally positioned to benefit from the convergence of wireline and wireless networks amid accelerating global 5G deployments,” the company said. CoreSite has 25 data centers and more than 32,000 interconnections in eight major U.S. markets, American Tower said. “We are in the early stages of a cloud-based, connected and globally distributed digital transformation that will evolve over the next decade and beyond,” said American Tower CEO Tom Bartlett. The deal is expected to close this year "or shortly thereafter."

Continental Automotive Systems urged the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to overturn an FCC order dividing the 5.9 GHz band. The company said auto safety technologies require the full 75 MHz allocation. “Neither collective perception messages nor maneuver coordination messages applications … will have sufficient spectrum to be deployed in the 5.9 GHz band if only 30 MHz remains for vehicle-to-everything; and these applications are critical safety-of-life applications that can prevent numerous non-line-of-sight crashes that cannot otherwise be prevented,” said Friday's brief. "The FCC shunned [the Department of Transportation’s] expertise” in the order, “essentially believing DOT lacked credibility,” Continental said. ITS America, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, and the Amateur Radio Emergency Data Network appealed the order (see 2111100083).

The extra cost to ensure access to ubiquitous 5G for all in the U.S., “and not just those who will be covered by currently planned private investment,” would be $36 billion, said a CostQuest Associates study, commissioned by the Competitive Carriers Association and released Friday. The FCC 2020 5G Fund order (see 2010270034) dedicates up to $9 billion to deploy in rural and hard-to-reach areas, the paper said. “While an important step and a welcomed increase in resources allocated specifically for mobile service, this figure was not supported with evidence that this amount would be enough to provide truly comparable wireless services to rural areas as those enjoyed in urban locations,” it said: “The Commission did not point to any data to support the budget amount, and indeed the 5G Fund Order was adopted before mobile coverage maps were updated, so reliable data to identify the total needed budget was unavailable.” Closing the digital divide isn’t “complete without access to mobile connectivity,” said CCA President Steve Berry: “I encourage policymakers to build on lessons learned from previous generations of wireless deployment and take immediate steps to allocate a sufficient budget for 5G support.”

Dish Network representatives told FCC staff that open radio access networks offer vendor flexibility, will enhance spectrum utilization and network slicing, and mean a more secure network. “DISH is well underway in its construction of a first-of-its-kind, cloud native, virtualized O-RAN 5G network,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 21-63: “Because DISH is building a greenfield network, we have the flexibility to choose the best technology to enter the market.”

The global fixed wireless access market is expanding quickly “to fulfill the need of high-speed broadband connectivity” for business and consumer segments, and 5G’s “fiber-like broadband service” capabilities are expected to speed FWA adoption, reported ABI Research Wednesday. It forecasts the FWA market will exceed 180 million subscriptions globally and generate $70 billion in revenue by 2026, when 5G FWA will have 40% of the total FWA market. “5G FWA services can be deployed faster and at lower cost” than fiber to the home, said ABI. Faster time-to-market at a lower rate of capital expenditures are the key advantages of FWA deployments “to expand the service coverage and boost adoption,” it said.

Nokia representatives said all open radio access network deployments aren’t equally open, in a call with staff from the FCC Office of Economics and Analytics and Wireless Bureau. “Simply declaring a deployment ‘open’ does not make it so, if, for example, it is achieved through a private agreement in which vendors have disclosed their specifications to each other but are not building to the type of open, common specifications envisioned by the O-RAN Alliance work,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 21-63: “Lack of conformity to common specifications would make it very difficult for another supplier to step into such a deployment later, effectively limiting the carrier’s options for partners. That is hardly the end-state ‘mix and match’ environment that would reflect an open ecosystem.” ORAN company Rakuten also spoke with staff from the OEA, Wireless Bureau and Office of Engineering and Technology. “Rakuten discussed and answered staff questions on how American wireless carriers can deploy an OpenRAN, cloud-native network,” the company said.

The FCC ignored federal law in dividing the 5.9 GHz band, with 45 MHz for Wi-Fi and 30 MHz for cellular vehicle-to-everything technology, petitioners told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in a Wednesday reply brief (in Pacer). ITS America, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials and the Amateur Radio Emergency Data Network want the court to overturn the order (see 2106020076). The FCC’s reallocation of 60% of the band “expressly ignores the statutory direction of Congress in the Transportation Equity Act,” they said. The FCC claims “this was a straightforward ‘spectrum management’ decision involving only the FCC’s typical balance of equities,” the groups said: “The Commission’s refusal to acknowledge the limitations imposed by the Transportation Equity Act is fatal, and its decision to rewrite the meaning of intelligent transportation systems cannot be defended under the overlapping statutes.”

T-Mobile is the exclusive 5G launch partner in North America for Qualcomm Technologies’ new Snapdragon Spaces XR Developer Platform, the carrier said Tuesday. T-Mobile said it’s working with startups and developers using the platform on augmented reality glasses starting next spring. “5G is powering more immersive experiences that better connect us to people and things around the world, and glasses will be one of the first disruptive new product categories,” said Neville Ray, T-Mobile president-technology: “First we need to build the ecosystem of developers that will bring new applications to life.”

T-Mobile filed a supplement to its Aug. 25 response answering FCC questions on its performance during the Aug. 11 nationwide wireless emergency alert test (see 2108260046). The carrier emphasized that system performance was “within normal parameters,” in a filing posted Tuesday in docket 15-91: “Within seconds, the alert was distributed to millions of cells sites over multiple technologies. This process was completed while separate live WEA alerts were issued and transmitted simultaneously. The system performed as intended and we did not observe any anomalies.”

Alarm Industry Communications Committee Chairman Louis Fiore and others from the group cited problems with AT&T’s pending shuttering of its 3G network (see 2109150041), in calls with an aide to FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks and staff from the Wireless and Consumer and Government Affairs bureaus, said a filing posted Tuesday in docket 21-304. AICC noted “the persons and activities that will be adversely impacted if an extension of the AT&T 3G sunset is not granted, including the safety implications for school children.”