Orbcomm completed its acquisition of Comtech’s Sensor Enabled Notification System (SENS) operation. The tracking operation includes satellite hardware, network technology and Web platforms, Orbcomm said in a news release (http://bit.ly/16GFUBC). The SENS system provides secure tracking and messaging products and services to government, defense, transportation and other industries, Orbcomm said. It allows customers “to retrieve and view critical data from the field via the Globalstar satellite network,” it said. SENS consists of satellite-based tracking devices, a network hub and an Internet-based back-office platform, Orbcomm said.

Broadcom Corp. bought a commercial license to use NextNav’s Metropolitan Beacon System (MBS) technology. The agreement enables Broadcom “to integrate NextNav’s advanced location technology into its mass-market global navigation satellite system (GNSS), connectivity and mobility platforms,” NextNav said in a press release (http://bit.ly/1aLjzAi). MBS is a terrestrial constellation, which brings GNSS-like performance “to indoor and urban environments where satellite-based positioning is either unavailable or significantly degraded,” it said. Because the NetNav beacons are installed terrestrially instead of in space, there is significant signal strength to function indoors and in urban markets “where a clear view of the sky is unavailable,” it said.

Lawmakers’ ongoing meetings with tech companies should be open to the public and press, argued six organizations promoting government transparency and privacy rights, in a letter to Reps. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Peter Welch, D-Vt., Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1fGEt9R). Blackburn and Welch head the House Privacy Working Group, which is meeting with 10 companies that collect and study user data. The letter acknowledges, “while we are pleased” the House is looking into “the enormously important issue of consumer privacy, there is simply no reason for your task force to hold closed-door” sessions. With the meetings resembling a traditional House hearing -- opening witness statements followed by a question and answer period -- the privacy advocates believe traditional “open meeting and hearings” rules should apply. “Meetings should be held in the open, a public record should be created, and various viewpoints should be heard,” the letter said. The issues being discussed are “common matters of public concern,” it said. Organizations behind the letter include the Electronic Privacy Information Center, the Consumer Federation of America and the Center for Digital Democracy.

The University of Wisconsin System will transition to a self-managed high speed data network over the next 14 to 18 months, said the UW System in a news release Tuesday (http://bit.ly/19VXspD). Wisconsin state legislation required the UW System to withdraw from WiscNet, a nonprofit consortium that provided connectivity to all UW campuses for the past 23 years, said the university. The UW-Madison’s Division of Information Technology will design, operate and manage the new network for all UW institutions and affiliates, said the UW System. The university system will spend about $33 million to procure, manage and maintain the network over the next five years, which is $13 million over the expected cost of remaining with WiscNet over the same time period. UW System representatives have withdrawn from WiscNet’s board and by the end of year, WiscNet will employ no UW staff, said the university. It will ask the Wisconsin Legislature to extend current statutory deadlines for a smooth transition from WiscNet to the new system, said UW.

The largest telecom companies -- primarily AT&T and Verizon -- “are having to build network infrastructure to carry traffic for which they can’t charge adequately thus reducing their return on investment, while their base services (landline telephones) are disappearing,” said a new report by Information Gatekeepers. The report attempts to understand network traffic patterns, and provides “hard data traffic forecasts by all sources of traffic on the network,” said the publisher, IGI Group.

CBS Sports Network was added to Time Warner Cable’s Digital TV package on most of its systems starting Monday, CBS said in a press release (http://bit.ly/151JP8K). CBS Sports airs more than 400 live games annually, and provides “extensive shoulder programming” around championship events, including the Super Bowl, The Masters and the US Open in tennis, the release said. The addition to TWC means the network is now seen in more than 53 million homes and has had an 18 percent distribution increase in the last 12 months, the release said.

The Washington Post Co. completed the sale of its newspaper publishing business to Jeff Bezos, said the seller in a news release Tuesday (http://bit.ly/16Yr0zS). The Amazon CEO agreed during the summer to pay $250 million for the Washington Post paper and some related operations (CD Aug 7 p4).

The Department of Justice asked a court to delay deadlines in lawsuits about surveillance documents. DOJ is struggling with lapsed funding due to the government shutdown. It requested a “a stay of this litigation, including pending deadlines related to the re-review, processing, and production of documents that are set forth” in court orders as part of a suit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation in 2011 in U.S. District Court in Oakland. Privacy advocates have sought documents on the interpretation of Patriot Act Section 215, which authorizes the federal government’s bulk collection of phone metadata, but don’t oppose DOJ’s motion, the Tuesday filing said. DOJ filed a similar motion to stay, based on the shutdown and its limited funding, in a case with the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. The ACLU expressed no objection, the Tuesday filing said. This case involved a July lawsuit from the ACLU following the surveillance leaks from then-National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit instructed a lower court to hear a zoning case brought by Roswell, Ga., after the court granted T-Mobile summary judgment on the grounds that the city’s denial of a cell tower permit sought by the carrier violated the Telecommunications Act. The unanimous decision by the three-judge panel was written by Judge Frank Hull. “After review of the briefs and record, with the benefit of oral argument, and in light of our decision in T-Mobile South, LLC v. City of Milton, Georgia, ... we reverse and remand for further proceedings,” the court said (http://1.usa.gov/1g1fonS). A key question in the case was whether Roswell’s decision denying the permit was “in writing and supported by substantial evidence contained in a written record” per the Telecom Act. “The district court adopted a reading of the ‘in writing’ requirement employed by several courts around the country,” the court said. “Under that reading, a separate written document delineating the specific reasons for the local government’s decision is required to satisfy the ‘in writing’ requirement.” The city countered the “decision was reduced in writing in numerous forms, including the denial letter, hearing minutes, and hearing transcript.” The court said the case raised the same issue raised in the City of Milton case. “This Court reasoned that the statute does not say that ’the decision [must] be “in a separate writing” or in a “writing separate from the transcript of the hearing and the minutes of the meeting in which the hearing was held” or “in a single writing that itself contains all of the grounds and explanations for the decision."’ ... Therefore, we concluded that ’to the extent that the decision must contain grounds or reasons or explanations, it is sufficient if those are contained in a different written document or documents that the applicant is given or has access to.'” The facts were nearly identical in the second case, the court said. “As in City of Milton, the City of Roswell provided T-Mobile with a written letter clearly stating that the City Council had denied T-Mobile’s request to build the proposed cell tower,” the court said. “That same letter informed T-Mobile that ‘[t]he minutes from the aforementioned hearing may be obtained from the city clerk’ and even provided T-Mobile with a contact to assist T-Mobile in obtaining the minutes. T-Mobile therefore had access to the written minutes of the City Council hearing where its request was denied.”

The FCC Media Bureau granted a petition Monday to exempt Charter Communications from municipal rate-setting for basic-video and some other prices in 46 communities in Massachusetts, New Hampshire and New York, said an order posted in FCC docket 12-1 (http://bit.ly/1c1A4fm). Charter’s petition cited video competition from DirecTV and Dish Network, the orders said. The Massachusetts Department of Telecommunications and Cable and the town of Berlin, Mass., filed objections to Charter’s petition, but the Media Bureau overruled both, the order said. MDTC had disputed Charter’s numbers demonstrating effective competition, but bureau rejected the utility’s arguments. Berlin had argued that Charter’s programming isn’t comparable to the direct broadcast satellite providers because the DBS providers don’t carry Berlin’s public, educational and government (PEG) channels. “We have repeatedly held that the absence of PEG channels from a competing service does not disqualify it from being comparable for purposes of determining effective competition,” said the Media Bureau order. The order affects about 200,000 people, including the communities of Worcester, Mass., Grafton, Mass., Brookline, N.H., and Austerlitz, N.Y.