Nokia announced an agreement with Amazon Web Services Monday to research and enable cloud radio access network and open RAN technologies. “The collaboration, which will be conducted at Nokia’s facilities, aims to develop innovative proof of concepts to explore and enable Cloud RAN and related technologies,” said a news release: “Nokia is pursuing a strategy of collaborating with AWS to extend the reach of its Cloud RAN technologies in support of 5G deployments and the development of new use cases.” Nokia also announced an agreement with Google Cloud “to develop new, cloud-based 5G radio solutions.” Nokia also reached an agreement with Microsoft “to develop new market-ready 4G and 5G private wireless use cases designed” for business customers. The collaboration combines Nokia’s cloud RAN technologies with Microsoft Azure cloud-based services.
Dish Network signed a master lease agreement with American Tower allowing Dish space on up to 20,000 communications sites as it deploys a 5G network. “DISH now has the complete, robust infrastructure portfolio we need to support our nationwide 5G network deployment,” said Dave Mayo, executive vice president-network development: “Our team has already developed colocation plans for American Tower sites across the country.” Dish now has MLAs with the three big U.S. tower companies, Raymond James’ Ric Prentiss emailed investors.
The FCC Public Safety Bureau agreed to a request by Morris County, New Jersey, for extra time to build three 700 MHz trunked public safety stations. The deadline was Feb. 8, 2020, and the county asked for an extra two years, said Friday's order. “Stringent application of our rule would effectively negate the significant efforts that the County has undertaken to design and construct its radio system,” the bureau said: “The County should be afforded additional time to avoid incurring unnecessary cost in finalizing and implementing its public safety communications system.”
Commercialization of 5G “continues to be strong,” Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf told his company's annual meeting Thursday, his last before his June retirement when he will be replaced by President Cristiano Amon. “We're early on” but 2020 “was the year that 5G really started to ramp,” Mollenkopf said. More than 140 operators have launched it in nearly 60 countries, and 270 more operators “are investing, making their plans known to go to 5G,” he said. Qualcomm expects a billion 5G connections in 2023, “two years faster than that same mark in 4G,” he said. Adoption of 5G smartphones remains "strong,” said Mollenkopf. Industry sold 225 million 5G smartphones in 2020, he said. “We expect that to grow to 500 million at the midpoint in 2021 and continue to grow.”
Former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler blasted the Trump administration’s lack of focus on 5G and spectrum, in a Brookings blog post Friday. A promised national spectrum strategy “was never delivered,” Wheeler said: “Donald Trump left office having made big statements about 5G and the importance of spectrum, but without a strategy to achieve those goals,” he said: “The failure of the Trump administration to decide among various priorities to establish a national spectrum policy has left the nation rudderless. It now falls to the Biden administration to place a firm hand on the rudder.”
Dish Network fired back Friday at T-Mobile's FCC filing (see 2103110055) on 3.45 GHz. "It's ironic that T-Mobile, a wireless incumbent with the largest spectrum trove in the United States, is against increasing the utility of spectrum held by other competitors,” emailed Jeffrey Blum, Dish executive vice president-external and legislative affairs: “No doubt they would take a different approach if they had real ownership in these bands. … T-Mobile itself has previously argued for increasing" citizens broadband radio service "spectrum power levels."
RS Access plans to submit comments and an engineering study on the FCC NRPM on feasibility of 12 GHz sharing between satellite and terrestrial 5G. The engineering "so far looks extremely promising," a company representative said Thursday in response to OneWeb urging that its technical study about the sharing feasibility be filed so parties can comment (see 2103110009).
The FCC OK'd priority access licenses for 222 of the 255 bidders in the citizens broadband radio service auction. The approved long-form applications cover 17,450 licenses, the FCC said Friday. The auction ended in August with total bids of $4.59 billion (see 2008260055). Verizon and major cable operators dominated, and Dish Network came in big (see 2009020057). Long-form applications were due Sept. 17. “Five years ago, this agency recognized that our traditional spectrum auctions needed an update -- and that the 3.5 GHz band was the perfect place to start,” said acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel: “We continue to make progress in implementing the 3.5 GHz band concept and further demonstrate US leadership in spectrum innovation.”
Kyocera launched a 5G smartphone on Verizon, the telecom gearmaker said Thursday. It's Kyocera’s first with a lithium polymer battery designed to survive drops and shocks.
TVU Networks and China Unicom are developing technology for collection, transmission, distribution and management of 4K and 8K Ultra HD video over 5G millimeter-wave networks, they said Thursday. Increased bandwidth, reduced latency and flexible configuration of the 5G mmWave band can enable capacity and transmission of future applications such as high-resolution video and immersive augmented and virtual reality, they said. China Unicom will be the exclusive mobile service provider at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.