With the TV incentive auction nearly a wrap, the outlook is very positive for the TV white spaces, the WhiteSpace Alliance said Wednesday. The auction is in its final stage, expected to be complete by the end of the month. “The completion of the incentive auction will remove regulatory uncertainty and free up more than 80 MHz of spectrum for license-exempt wireless Internet access,” said Apurva Mody, chairman of the alliance, in a news release. “TV white space technology can now enable broadband services to be delivered cost-efficiently across the United States, especially in rural and underserved users. We have seen innovative applications in medical, military and home markets from use of unlicensed spectrum in 2.5 GHz ISM bands. This newly available spectrum will support additional digital infrastructure development across the United States, and help foster the Industrial Internet of Things.”

The FCC Public Safety Bureau once again extended the freeze on accepting new 800 MHz applications along the U.S.-Mexico border. No date was given for when it will be lifted. “The extension is needed to preserve vacant channels for licensees re-tuning their systems according to the Bureau’s updated band plan for licensees operating along the border with Mexico,” said a Wednesday notice. “As of this date, many Mexico border region licensees have yet to complete their system re-tunes.” The freeze applies only to applications for new facilities or modification applications that involve a change of frequency or expand a station's existing coverage area, the bureau said. The freeze covers the five National Public Safety Planning Advisory Committee regions along the U.S. border with Mexico and stations located within 70 miles of these regions' borders, the PN said.

The record shows the spectrum reserve had little effect on the TV incentive auction, said Competitive Carriers Association General Counsel Rebecca Thompson in a Wednesday blog post. The reserve set aside 30 MHz for bidders who don’t have low-band holdings of 45 MHz or more in a single market (see 1508060028). About 90.4 percent of the auction’s overall $19.6 billion in revenue was bid before the auction satisfied the conditions for the reserve, Thompson said. In a few markets, reserve blocks sold at a higher price than non-reserve blocks, she said. “The spectrum reserve worked exactly as intended,” Thompson wrote. “The market-based mechanism provided greater access to critical low-band resources for all, without the threat of market dominance thwarting competition. By stimulating interest and increasing participation, the spectrum reserve arguably increased auction pricing above what it might otherwise have been.”

A consortium of Washington State cities urged the FCC to move with care as it considers a Mobilitie petition asking the agency to pre-empt state and local authority over rights of way (see 1702280039). “While it is reasonable to provide access for small cell deployments to existing utility poles, the installation of new structures dedicated to small cell or macro cell use and the use of replacement structures different from or larger than the originals are subjects which require greater scrutiny,” the cities said. “We should be permitted to require providers to assess other reasonable options such as roof-mounted equipment, panel antennas and co-location through ‘least intrusive means’ tests before installing macro tower transmission facilities or new or larger replacement structures in the public rights-of-way, particularly in underground areas, downtown districts, sensitive view corridors, historic districts and environmentally sensitive areas such as the shoreline.” The comments were posted in docket 16-421. The Wyoming Department of Transportation (WYDOT) said “existing federal laws, FCC rulings, Wyoming state laws, WYDOT rules and regulations and WYDOT procedures” are adequate to guarantee siting without the need for further FCC action. “Further declaratory judgment concerning telecommunication facility placement in these rights of way is unnecessary as the Communications Act grants states authority to decide whether to permit right of way use and determine appropriate and safe right of way locations of telecommunication utilities,” WYDOT said in a filing.

The FCC released the text of its Mobility Fund II (MF-II) order, which commissioners approved at their Feb. 23 meeting (see 1702230042). The order projects an MF-II auction next year. It provides $453 million per year over 10 years to preserve and extend 4G LTE in areas where the market otherwise wouldn't support wireless broadband. “We expect to release a list of presumptively eligible areas shortly, to finalize the challenge process in the coming months, and to conclude the challenge process by January 31, 2018,” the FCC said. “We expect to commence the auction shortly thereafter.” The FCC will start phasing out some legacy funding in the first month after the close of the MF-II auction, the order said. It counters what it says are arguments by some commenters that the FCC is dedicating too little money to the new fund. “The amount we dedicate reflects our priorities in allocating a finite budget to areas of greatest need to maintain and expand critical mobile voice and broadband services,” the order said. “Our MF-II budget is based on the current high-cost support received by wireless providers of approximately $483 million per year, excluding Alaska, minus $30 million per year, representing the amount (spread over ten years) we estimate is needed to fund a two-year phase-down in census blocks where private capital has fully deployed 4G LTE.” That level of support over the next 10 years “will allow MF-II to achieve its objectives in a fiscally responsible manner,” the FCC said. Rural Wireless Association General Counsel Caressa Bennet welcomed release of the order. “In particular, RWA remains pleased that the challenge process will be addressed by a Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking,” she said in a statement. “There is no program more vital to maintaining and expanding mobile voice and broadband services in rural America.”

Consumers can’t wait for the launch of 5G, but further enhancement to 4G LTE will have to come first, said Qualcomm Senior Vice President Dean Brenner at a Politico Live event Tuesday. “It’s crucial that today, and I mean literally today, we deliver tremendous enhancements to 4G and accelerate the timing of 5G, and we’re doing precisely that,” he said. Brenner said 5G will have to use low-, mid- and high-band spectrum, across licensed, unlicensed and shared bands. “In other words, by using every sliver of spectrum, 5G will provide the type of wireless connectivity that we can only dream about today,” he said. Fifth-generation service also will mean what Qualcomm calls “the massive internet of things,” he said. The IoT already is happening over 4G, but massive IoT, with billions of connected devices, will require 5G, he said. Some use cases -- from autonomous cars to remote brain surgery to very-high-performance robotics -- will require more than 4G, Brenner said. “No one would do these things with 4G, but the goal is to enable them with 5G from the ground up,” he said. AT&T is “still trying to understand the capabilities of the bands” that will make up 5G service through ongoing tests, said Joan Marsh, AT&T senior vice president-regulatory. “Think about very, very wide bands,” she said. “As opposed to the smaller bands that we deal with today, think about hundreds of gigahertz put together.” The use of wide bands will drive 5G “in terms of speed, in terms of low latency, in terms of different applications,” she said. LTE will remain important, Marsh said. “LTE has a long runway, so don’t think of 5G as a replacement for 4G because there’s a lot of things that LTE is capable of doing,” she said. AT&T is densifying its network to pave the way for 5G, Marsh said. “Think about ubiquitous deployment of small cells, distributed antenna systems, picocells, other small cells in the local area, that’s really going to densify the network,” she said. LTE is very fast and “does broadband very well, but it’s harder to make it do other things,” said Steve Crowley, a consulting engineer. Brenner is right, some applications would be difficult on LTE, Crowley said. “Basically, there’s more delay,” he said. “You have more latency in LTE that’s built into the physical layer if you will, the actual radio part, that’s locked in.” LTE is evolving, but “you’re still locked into the framework,” he said. “In the meantime, technology improves.”

Connected home solutions ownership remains an early adopter phenomenon, a Gartner survey found. Gartner canvassed nearly 10,000 online respondents in the U.S., U.K. and Australia and found that only 10 percent of homes currently have connected home solutions installed, it said in a Monday report. “Although households in the developed world are beginning to embrace connected home solutions, providers must push beyond early adopter use," said the firm. "If they are to successfully widen the appeal of the connected home, providers will need to identify what will really motivate current users to inspire additional purchases." The survey found that home security alarm systems, the more established of connected home solutions, have nearly double the adoption rates (18 percent) of newer connected home platforms such as home monitoring (11 percent), home automation or energy management (9 percent) and health and wellness management (11 percent). Overall adoption rates are 5-6 percent higher in the U.S., where the solutions were first marketed, compared with other developed markets, it said.

The FCC has life or death decisions to make about contraband cellphones in correctional facilities, Marcus Spectrum Solutions said in a filing in docket 13-111. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai circulated an order last week on the issue (see 1703020063). Marcus put at the top of its filing photos of Carl Lackl, a murder witness who was murdered himself due to a “hit” ordered over a cellphone by a prisoner, and Capt. Robert Johnson, a South Carolina prison guard injured in a similar attack. “It is untraditional to begin comments with photographs, but we do this for an important point: this proceeding is very different from most FCC proceedings which usually determine economic benefits for one party or another,” Marcus said. “Not since the Commission’s 1990 deliberations over 2 deaths in a helicopter crash into a North Carolina cellular tower that violated the Commission’s Rules has there been such a clear matter of life and death at [the] FCC.” The FCC focused on managed access systems (MAS) preferred by carriers, but MAS isn’t enough, Marcus said. “As in the War on Drugs, true control of this problem will only come from working on both the supply problem and the demand problem,” Marcus said.

When spectrum was plentiful, full-band, full-arc coordination was a nonissue, but now earth station spectrum hoarding "has become problematic," the Fixed Wireless Communications Coalition said in a RM-11778 filing Monday. FWCC called it "unthinkable" that the FCC would adopt such a rules approach today. "In no other service is a licensee permitted to block others from unused, non-auctioned spectrum," FWCC said. In response to satellite interest concerns raised about satellite spectrum needs in emergencies (see 1701250056), it said there's "no plausible logic" for fixed satellite service (FSS) to enjoy protection "at the expense of the co-primary" fixed services (FS). With FS also facing outages and emergencies, it "should not have to bear all of the risks as between the two services," FWCC said, saying its petition for changes in earth station siting rules (see 1610180035) would parcel out that risk more evenly. And FWCC disputed satellite interest arguments, saying neither the FS or FSS industries complained about FSS being restricted in earth station sitings for FS's 4 GHz terrestrial operations, not because the rules so favored FS incumbents but because spectrum pressures were far lower.

Anyone who trades in a qualifying smartphone and signs up for a T-Mobile One service contract with an existing number can get an Apple iPhone 7 free, or an iPhone 7 Plus for $100, through March 16, the carrier said Friday.