FCC Chairman Ajit Pai agrees with the finding of a recent GAO report that the FCC should “promote awareness about the elements of and any outcomes from the Wireless Network Resiliency Cooperative Framework agreement among state and local public safety officials and other industry stakeholders, such as through existing outreach mechanisms and government-industry forums," he said in letters to Capitol Hill. House Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., released the report in January (see 1801100060). It said the FCC should develop a plan for monitoring the outputs and outcomes of the framework and document the results of its monitoring to evaluate the results. “I will ensure that FCC staff has developed a structured plan to monitor and evaluate the Framework's impact on wireless network resiliency,” Pai said. “We will then work with industry and other affected stakeholders to identify areas for improvement and determine how the Framework may be adjusted to better improve wireless network resiliency." Pai sent the letter to Pallone and other leaders of the House and Senate commerce committees.

CTIA urged the FCC to act “quickly” to modify the priority access license rules for the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band. The most important changes are auctioning PALs for a 10-year term with an expectation of renewal and in sizes larger than census tracts, CTIA said in meetings with aides to Commissioners Mike O’Rielly and Brendan Carr. Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile officials were also there. The changes would give licensees “greater certainty and encourage investment,” CTIA said in docket 17-258. “Making these targeted reforms to the CBRS framework will help unlock the benefits that 5G will bring to the U.S. economy -- benefits that were not foreseen when this proceeding was originally undertaken -- by providing faster speeds and additional bandwidth needed to support the Internet of Things.”

Representatives of Panasonic, the Safety Spectrum Coalition and state departments of transportation held meetings at the FCC, including with aides to the five commissioners, on the importance of the 5.9 GHz band. Panasonic and the others don’t say in a filing whether the band should be set aside for dedicated short-range communications (DSRC) or cellular vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) technology proposed by Qualcomm and others. They stressed the importance of the band to automotive safety. “V2X technology dramatically increases roadway safety, with the potential to eliminate 89 percent of Light Vehicle to Light Vehicle crashes and 85 percent of their associated economic costs,” said the filing in docket 13-49. “The state representatives each talked about current and planned deployment of V2X roadway safety technology and how the full allotment of 5.9 GHz spectrum must be preserved for V2X to avoid stranding significant investment.” An official from the Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT) cited the Utah Smart Transit Signal Priority project, using V2X to give transit vehicles priority at traffic signals. “The project is the first of several connected vehicle projects undertaken by UDOT and is intended to pave the way for other uses of V2V technology for transportation management and highway safety,” the filing said. An official from the Michigan DOT said the state has deployed or plans to deploy 400 DSRC roadside units before the end of 2019. “MDOT enacted a policy to add DSRC technology at every signal location statewide as it is being modernized,” the filing said.

Cree bought Infineon’s RF power business for about 345 million euros ($428 million) to expand its Wolfspeed wireless market opportunity, the companies announced. Infineon will continue its focus on its connectivity businesses, including autonomous driving, they said Tuesday.

An October FCC order on hearing aid compatibility (HAC) and volume control on wireline and wireless phones takes effect March 30 (see 1710240062 or 1710240058), said a Tuesday public notice. The rules include a requirement that within three years, all HAC wireless handsets include volume controls.

The recently concluded Mobile World Congress raised some troubling questions for the wireless industry, ABI Research said Tuesday. The MWC “left many of us deeply concerned about the future health of the mobile ecosystem and the Mobile Service Provider (MSP) community in particular,” wrote Stuart Carlaw, ABI chief research officer. “With some notable exceptions, MSPs look set to be relegated to a marginalized position in the next industrial revolution.” Many see the carriers as “simple pipe providers,” he said. “There is a growing chasm between what MSPs should be doing versus what they are doing and can do.” Any belief that 5G will be the “savior” for the industry and cellular “the only connectivity for IoT is fundamentally flawed,” he said. Providers also have “an unnatural fixation with killer apps and business models,” Carlaw wrote. “The mobile community continues to peddle technology rather than offer holistic solutions. Enterprises want solutions, not an alphabet soup of three letter abbreviations. MSPs are not simplifying the decision tree for potential customers, but rather complicating it and slowing down market momentum.”

The Rural Wireless Association criticized an order denying the group’s challenge of a January waiver by the FCC Wireless Bureau, giving AT&T extra time to build out facilities offering wireless service using 700 MHz in the cellular market area serving the Wade Hampton, Alaska, market (see 1803050046). But RWA said the order was partially positive. The order “undermines the FCC's rules against spectrum warehousing by allowing AT&T to retain the exclusive right to serve the approximately 90 percent of the geographic area of [the market] that remains unserved more than eight years after the license was granted,” RWA said in a news release. “Thanks to RWA's efforts, however, AT&T must file a marker showing its coverage as of June 13, 2017. This filing will hold AT&T's feet to the fire to meet its obligations for the license.” AT&T didn't comment. In a second order Monday, the full FCC also denied an RWA application for review of the Wireless Bureau granting a waiver to the Alaska Wireless Network of both the interim and final geographic coverage requirements for a single 700 MHz license covering the entire state (see 1708030059). “It is well-established that the Commission may waive a rule where the particular facts make strict compliance inconsistent with the public interest, and it may take into account considerations of hardship, equity, or more effective implementation of overall policy on an individual basis,” the FCC said.

The FCC denied the Rural Wireless Association’s challenge of a January waiver by the Wireless Bureau, giving AT&T extra time to build out facilities offering wireless service using 700 MHz in the cellular market area serving the Wade Hampton, Alaska, market. Absent the waiver, AT&T would have had to serve 35 percent of the geographic area covered by the license by Dec. 13, 2016, or have its end-of-license term and related 70 percent geographic-area construction requirement accelerated by two years, to June 13, 2017. Commissioners affirmed the finding that “strict application of Section 27.14(g)(1) here would frustrate the rule’s underlying purpose and that grant of the conditional waiver will serve the public interest, including by facilitating the introduction of wireless broadband services in [the market], all of which is rural area in the interior and northern reaches of Alaska,” the order said.

TV white spaces have untapped potential and Wi-Fi, LTE and other technology could increase robustness of TVWS radios, Microsoft executives told FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr and an aide to Commissioner Mignon Clyburn. White spaces devices can bond two contiguous channels, resulting in delivered speeds up to 23 Mbps, Microsoft said in docket 16-56. Better antenna technologies, more efficient higher modulation and “the ability to bond and/or aggregate pieces of spectrum together,” have great potential, Microsoft said. “Radios utilizing TV white space spectrum will add these capabilities over time,” it said. “TVWS radios that can bond up to 4 contiguous channels are being trialed under FCC experimental licenses. These radios are delivering throughput of up to 50 Mbps.” Microsoft said it's working with Adaptrum “and another major US technology company on a baseband chip which leverages the published IEEE 802.11af standard.”

Mobile device manufacturers should take a more comprehensive approach to recording security update information, said FTC Consumer Protection Bureau Senior Attorney Lesley Fair Monday. Recordkeeping should include more information on security update support length, update frequency and update acceptance so manufacturers can “learn from experience,” she said. Her comments support recommendations made in an FTC report last week. Fair said the report analyzed: Are consumers getting the patches they need to protect against critical vulnerabilities? Are companies timely deploying those patches? Why do so many devices go without critical patches? CTA and CTIA didn't comment.