Charter Communications is testing of use of the 3.5 GHz spectrum in fixed wireless applications in some markets and mobility applications in others, like Tampa, it blogged Friday. It said the testing will help prepare for its mobile wireless service launch, expected in the middle of this year (see 1804270033). It said it has 200 citizens broadband radio service small cellsites deployed in Tampa in a variety of settings, and it's considering how the CBRS band could be part of its wireless operations. Charter said it plans ubiquitous wireless connectivity through a mix of Wi-Fi 4G, LTE and 5G

AT&T Senior Vice President Joan Marsh met with aides to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner Mike O’Rielly on the company's December proposal for a temporary, voluntary repack of the 38.6-40 GHz band (see 1712120010). “We discussed AT&T’s proposal to accelerate 5G deployments by permitting 39 GHz licensees to temporarily repack their holdings into contiguous channels,” said a filing in docket 14-177. “Such temporary arrangements would terminate upon completion of a permanent rebanding, whether by auction or through secondary market transactions.”

The Competitive Carriers Association agrees with Rural Wireless Association concerns (see 1803210063) that the Mobility Fund II challenge process “could leave significant rural areas impossible to challenge and supports the request to modify certain challenge procedures,” CCA said in Monday news release. “Under the FCC’s current challenge process, there is a real risk that many rural areas may be left behind in the digital world,” said CCA President Steve Berry. “CCA members serve some of the most rural and hard-to-reach areas, and access to MF II support is absolutely essential to ensuring these areas can reap the benefits of robust mobile broadband services. I strongly encourage the FCC to modify the Challenge Notice to ensure no square foot of the country is inappropriately deemed ineligible for MF II support.”

The National Institute of Standards and Technology is developing a virtual reality simulation program that will allow first responders to practice emergency response operation and communication. One virtual scenario is firefighting in a hotel, NIST said, and researchers are creating scenarios for law enforcement. “We’re creating this test bed because we don’t believe anyone else has the focus or capabilities to test user interfaces for first responders,” NIST project leader Scott Ledgerwood said. NIST said companies will be able to visit NIST “soon” to test experimental interfaces.

Despite its $1,000 entry point, the iPhone X was the world’s best-selling smartphone in Q1 with 16 million shipped, Strategy Analytics reported Friday. Total smartphone shipments dropped 2.4 percent from the year-ago quarter to 345.4 million, said SA. The firm estimates Apple shipped nearly 50 million iPhone X phones globally since the November launch, capturing 5 percent market share. Apple’s 8 and 8 Plus, with 12.5 million and 8.3 million shipments, are in second and third, and the iPhone 7, with 5.6 million shipments, is fourth in global market share, it said. In Q1, Apple owned four of the world’s six most popular smartphone models, it said. The report placed Xiaomi’s Redmi 5A in fifth with 5.4 million shipments and the Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus, which began shipping during the quarter, in sixth with 5.3 million units. The research firm expects the S9 Plus to become the best-selling Android smartphone globally this quarter.

The FCC Wireless Bureau started a hearing proceeding before the FCC administrative law judge to decide whether Metro Two-Way is qualified to remain a licensee. “Based on the totality of the evidence, there are substantial and material questions of fact as to whether Metro repeatedly made misrepresentations to and lacked candor with the Commission in its submission of several applications in connection with various Wireless Radio Service authorizations,” said a Thursday order. One question is whether Metro is controlled by Acumen Communications, “which had received multiple Notices of Violation from the Commission’s Enforcement Bureau” and has been “the subject of an Enforcement Bureau investigation,” the bureau said. Metro denied it's controlled by Acumen, the bureau said. Metro Two-Way didn't comment Friday.

Comments will be due July 6, replies Aug. 6 on an FCC Further NPRM on the 4.9 GHz public safety band. Commissioners approved the FNPRM in March (see 1803220037). “The Commission proposes several rule changes and seeks comment on alternatives with the goal of promoting increased public safety use of the band while opening up the spectrum to additional uses that will encourage a more robust market for equipment and greater innovation,” the notice said. A second notice said streamlining changes by NTIA in the coordination process enabling the FCC to grant licenses to non-federal public safety entities who seek to operate on 40 federal government interoperability channels take effect, for the most part, June 6. “Under the new process, the Statewide Interoperability Coordinator (SWIC) or state appointed official in each state is responsible for coordinating access to the federal interoperability channels by non-federal public safety entities,” the notice said. “Each SWIC/official will sign an agreement with a federal user with a valid assignment.” The part that doesn’t take effect is a new information collection that requires review by the Office of Management and Budget under the Paperwork Reduction Act.

The National Public Safety Telecommunication Council asked the FCC to make clear to the wireless industry it needs to follow the agency’s definition of “dispatchable location.” As the FCC defines it that term means “the verified or corroborated street 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,” NPSTC said. Providing that information is vital to call centers, the group said. “With this information in hand, 9-1-1 professionals can help direct field responders to the scene of the emergency and enable them to provide life-saving assistance more quickly.” NPSTC filed in docket 07-114.

Tesla is “making really good progress” toward achieving full autonomy in self-driving vehicles that would become part of a ride-sharing network, said CEO Elon Musk on a Wednesday earnings call. “We'll probably be ready by the end of next year.” Regulatory oversight is the big unknown in light of recent fatalities, said Musk, including the death of a Tesla Model X driver in a March 23 accident in Mountain View, California. Musk ripped into the news media for what he called “inflammatory” stories falsely depicting autonomous-driving as unsafe. “Autonomy doesn't reduce the accident rate or fatality rate to zero,” he said. "It improves it substantially.” If the media are “hounding the regulators, and the public is laboring on misapprehension that autonomy is less safe because of misleading press, then this is where I find the challenge of predicting it to be very difficult,” said Musk of timelines for regulatory OK. The company is seeing a “steady increase” in the “percentage of miles driven using Autopilot,” except for temporary “dips” that occurred after accidents like the one in Mountain View, said Musk.

The Enterprise Wireless Alliance said the Wireless Infrastructure Association is the only opponent of a Land Mobile Communications Council proposal that the FCC provide a six-month window to incumbent 800 MHz licensees to add expansion band (EB) and guard and (GB) channels to existing systems before opening the spectrum to new entrants. WIA said last month in docket 16-261 the FCC should “encourage competition in the EB and GB channels by continuing policies that do not give incumbent operators priority access to available EB or GB channels, which could bar new entrants and deter innovation.” WIA is wrong, EWA President Mark Crosby said in a Friday statement. “Incumbents are as likely to introduce innovation as are new entrants,” Crosby said. “WIA’s suggestion ignores the track record established by public safety, manufacturing, utility, aviation, pipeline, and other entities … demanding and deploying increasingly efficient and advanced technologies that enable them to provide services to the public and to remain competitive in an increasingly challenging worldwide marketplace.”