The FCC should hold the TV incentive auction as planned next year, T-Mobile CEO John Legere told commissioners in meetings last week, said an ex parte filing posted Monday in docket 12-269. Legere met with all five FCC members, as well as key wireless staffers, the filing said. Legere “discussed the impact T-Mobile has had on competition in the industry for the benefit of consumers” and the importance of low-band spectrum, the filing said. Delaying the incentive auction “would only benefit AT&T and Verizon, which hold approximately 73 percent of the low-band spectrum today,” he said. T-Mobile needs low-band spectrum to compete against AT&T and Verizon, Legere argued. The timing of the auction has been in question, with commissioners saying at CES that they support a pause (see 1501120046). Industry officials tell us a 2016 auction works to T-Mobile's advantage because the spectrum aggregation rules approved for the auction limit buys by AT&T and Verizon, which could be changed under another administration.
Despite “saturation” in many well-developed Western European markets, unit smartphone shipments in Europe overall climbed nearly 14 percent last year to 200 million handsets, Futuresource Consulting said Monday in a report. The European tablet market also continues to grow, “but major markets have reached saturation point earlier than the industry expected,” Futuresource said. Although percentage growth in tablets equaled that of smartphones in 2014, growth in Western Europe “will slow further in 2015, with consumer shipments moving into decline by 2017,” it said. "We're seeing a smartphone growth bubble in Eastern Europe, perpetuated by the low level of ownership in many of its countries," the company said. "It's not all good news, as we expect growth to slow in 2015 as Russia -- the largest market in the region by some distance -- faces increasing economic uncertainty.” Across Europe, the Samsung and Apple “duopoly remains solid,” albeit with some market share being lost to Microsoft following its acquisition of Nokia’s devices business, the firm said. “This decline in smartphone prices was somewhat offset by a persistent shift towards higher-priced smartphones,” resulting in an overall increase in mobile handset average selling prices, it said. As for tablets, Apple and Samsung represented more than half of total units shipped in Europe last year, it said.
AT&T will emerge as the high bidder when results are eventually released from the AWS-3 auction, predicted analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. They said in a Monday research note that AT&T will spend “upward” of $22 billion in the auction: “We are looking for management commentary with regard to what effect, if any, this spending will have on dividend increases and future share repurchase programs."
Paige Atkins was named associate administrator, Office of Spectrum Management, at NTIA, a key position within that agency on spectrum issues of concern to the wireless industry. She replaces Karl Nebbia, now at Wiley Rein. Atkins had been acting associate administrator since Nebbia left last year. An electrical engineer, Atkins was formerly vice president of Cyber and Information Technology Research at the Virginia Tech Applied Research Corp. and director-strategic planning and information at the Defense Information Systems Agency.
T-Mobile officials and economists working for the carrier met with FCC staff to urge changes to rules for the TV incentive auction, said a filing by the company in docket 12-269, posted Friday. T-Mobile flagged “the potential for interplay between the proposed structure of the extended rounds and the spectrum reserve in certain scenarios with high spectrum-clearing targets,” said the filing. “Under the current proposal, a large differential between bid prices and reverse-auction expenses could theoretically eliminate the spectrum reserve in the extended round and subsequent rounds despite exceptionally robust bidding by reserve-eligible bidders. The parties discussed technical solutions to avoid this outcome, which they said is most likely to occur in early rounds of bidding." The Competitive Carriers Association, meanwhile, reported on a second meeting with Gary Epstein and Howard Symons of the FCC Incentive Auction Task Force and Roger Sherman, chief of the Wireless Bureau, also about the incentive auction. Officials from Sprint and T-Mobile were also at the meeting, said a second filing in the same docket. “CCA discussed the competitive need for low-band spectrum and the critical importance of holding the incentive auction as quickly as possible.”
Officials with SouthernLINC Wireless raised concerns about provisions it understands are in the FCC’s proposed rules for wireless location accuracy on calls made indoors, during a series of eighth-floor meetings, said a filing posted by Friday in docket 07-114. The FCC is to vote on rules Thursday (see 1501130062). SouthernLINC's understanding is the rules include “new location accuracy requirements for both horizontal (x/y-axis) and vertical (z-axis) location information that would exclude any location information or measurements obtained through the use of satellite-assisted technologies,” the carrier said. “The rationale for excluding satellite-generated measurements is to create a proxy for ‘indoor-only’ 9-1-1 calls, based on the assumption that satellite-assisted technologies are unable to provide location information for wireless 9-1-1 calls made from indoor locations.” Both provisions raise “significant concerns,” the carrier said. T-Mobile also raised concerns about the order. In a letter to the agency, T-Mobile encouraged the agency to develop reasonable standards. Establishing compliance metrics for indoor wireless calls has long been an FCC goal, T-Mobile said. “But that task has been stymied by the difficulty of measuring indoor compliance,” it said. “For instance, it has long been clear that widespread local-level compliance testing, of the kind used for outdoor location accuracy compliance, is simply not feasible for indoor location assessment.” In a third filing posted Friday, New America’s Open Technology Institute reported on various meetings at the FCC to discuss privacy concerns raised by the proposed requirements. “It is critical for the Commission to address privacy concerns associated with E911 at this stage, before the technology is developed and deployed,” the group said.
The National Public Safety Telecommunications Council is examining whether interference from LED and fluorescent lighting system ballasts are disrupting public safety radio systems, said a NPSTC news release. NPSTC asks public agencies to fill out an online questionnaire. In 2013, the FCC ordered one manufacturer to make changes to its LED lighting transformers after interference concerns emerged, NPSTC said. “More recently, some public safety agencies have reported interference from LED lights installed on agency radio towers, from fluorescent lighting installed at an incident command post, and from commercial buildings with large lighting systems.”
Sprint said it will give T-Mobile customers a “guaranteed minimum” of $200 instantly for current working smartphones when they bring their wireless number to Sprint. Sprint also will continue to match all major U.S. carrier phone trade-in pricing, it said Friday. The offer runs through April 9 and can be combined with a contract buyout in which eligible T-Mobile customers can get up to $350 per line via a prepaid or reward card to cover their installment billing balance on their current phone or early termination fees, Sprint said. The carrier matches AT&T and Verizon pricing via the Sprint Buyback program but without the $200 switchover reward, a Sprint spokeswoman told us.
APCO and the National Emergency Number Association filed separate letters at the FCC urging the agency to approve the road map the groups worked out with CTIA and the major wireless carriers on indoor wireless location accuracy rules. The FCC is poised to vote on rules Jan. 29. The road map's release followed seven months of work, APCO said. “The Roadmap is designed to produce a dispatchable location -- defined as the ‘civic address of the calling party plus additional information such as floor, suite, apartment or similar information that may be needed to adequately identify the location of the calling party,’” APCO said. “Dispatchable location is public safety’s gold standard for indoor location accuracy.” NENA's comments agreed: “The Roadmap is the product of many months of intensive negotiations and technical analysis, and represents the most robust agreement our organization could achieve in partnership with the carriers.” TruePosition, which wants the FCC to reject the road map, criticized the revised plan filed at the FCC this week by AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon (see Ref:1501210004]). “APCO and NENA did not sign this latest ‘Modified Roadmap,’ but even if these organizations do support it, this alternative to the FCC’s proposed rules has not been thoroughly vetted and endorsed by the most critical participants in this rulemaking proceeding: the First Responders and Public Safety officers who desperately need accurate indoor location information for emergency 911 calls placed by wireless phones,” TruePosition said. The FCC posted the letters Thursday in docket 07-114.
The FCC established a pleading cycle on TeleGuam’s proposed buy of an upper 700 MHz C-block license and two AWS-1 licenses from Club 42. The licenses cover two cellular market areas (CMAs) -- Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands. “Our preliminary review indicates that TeleGuam would be assigned 42 to 62 megahertz of spectrum in five counties in these two CMAs,” the FCC said. “Post-transaction, TeleGuam would hold 82 to 97 megahertz of spectrum in total, including 47 megahertz of below-1-GHz spectrum” in Guam. Petitions to deny are due Feb. 20, oppositions March 2 and replies March 9.