AT&T officials met with FCC staff on the proposed design for a 39 GHz auction. Among those at the meeting was Wireless Bureau Chief Donald Stockdale. "Parties discussed the Commission’s proposed pre-auction voucher exchange, including issues specific to incumbents who exchange vouchers with an intent to participate in the auction and incumbents who exchange vouchers with an intent to retain their existing spectrum holdings without participation in the clock phase,” said a filing posted Monday in docket 14-177.
Wireless Spectrum Auctions
The FCC manages and licenses the electromagnetic spectrum used by wireless, broadcast, satellite and other telecommunications services for government and commercial users. This activity includes organizing specific telecommunications modes to only use specific frequencies and maintaining the licensing systems for each frequency such that communications services and devices using different bands receive as little interference as possible.
What are spectrum auctions?
The FCC will periodically hold auctions of unused or newly available spectrum frequencies, in which potential licensees can bid to acquire the rights to use a specific frequency for a specific purpose. As an example, over the last few years the U.S. government has conducted periodic auctions of different GHz bands to support the growth of 5G services.
NTCH isn't an AWS-4 band licensee or operating in adjacent spectrum that could face interference from Dish Network using the lower AWS-4 band for downlinks rather than uplinks, so it doesn't have standing to challenge the FCC waiving some technical rules that applied to Dish's AWS-4 licenses, the agency said Wednesday in a U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit motion to dismiss (in Pacer, docket 18-1242). NTCH sued after the agency in August upheld a Wireless Bureau waiver request it was appealing (see 1808160065). NTCH claims that waiver thwarted its plans to participate in the H-block option, but it had decided not to take part in the auction before the bureau granted the waiver request. D.C. Circuit precedent is that a general complaint about the government doesn't qualify for Article III standing, the FCC said. NTCH counsel Don Evans of Fletcher Heald emailed that the motion was expected since the FCC attacked its mandamus petition previously on standing grounds. He said the FCC acknowledged that NTCH has standing to challenge H-Block auction procedures and that the waiver and the extension of time for Dish to construct AWS-4 facilities were explicit quid pro quos for Dish's payment of $1.5 billion in the H-Block auction. That deal gave Dish enormous advantages not enjoyed by any other auction participant and makes the waiver/extension integral to the H-Block auction process and challengeable by a thwarted bidder, he said. The court granted a Dish motion (in Pacer) to intervene Monday.
FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr and others at a 5G Americas technology forum Thursday welcomed President Donald Trump directing development of a comprehensive national spectrum policy (see 1810250018). Trump also rescinded two Obama administration spectrum policy memos. The Trump memo requires all government agencies report to the Commerce Department on their current and anticipated spectrum requirements. Reports will be due at the White House in 180 days, with a strategy due 90 days later.
The Wireless ISP Association is “disappointed” with the FCC’s 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service rules (see 1810230037), said a Wednesday news release. “We commend the FCC for rejecting the idea of auctioning CBRS licenses at the very large Partial Economic Area (PEA) level,” said WISPA President Claude Aiken. “However, the new combination of county-sized licenses, package bidding, long license terms, and renewal expectancy will shut out a significant portion of our members from using licensed CBRS spectrum to bring affordable, reliable broadband services to under-served rural areas.”
U.S. broadband capital expenditures rose 2 percent in 2017 to $76.3 billion, said USTelecom's annual report Thursday. The group credited the FCC's recent "internet freedom" and tech transition orders and congressional "tax reform" with helping to reverse a two-year capex decline that "began" when the FCC "moved to impose common carrier" regulation on broadband providers in 2015. The report confirms FCC "policies to promote broadband deployment are working," said FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. "Investment is pouring back into this space," said Commissioner Brendan Carr at a USTelecom event.
The Wireless ISP Association told the FCC members will be left out if the agency approves only county-sized priority access licenses in the citizens broadband radio service band. The proposed rules appear headed to a 3-1 vote at Tuesday's commissioners' meeting (see 1810160068). WISPA representatives met aides to all commissioners. WISPA asked the order be changed to approve at least two census-tract-sized PALs per market. “While county-based PALs may be acceptable to larger WISPA members, the majority of WISPA members are small broadband providers that would be able to participate in the auction in greater numbers and with better opportunities for success if the Commission auctioned PALs by census tracts,” the group said Wednesday in docket 17-258. “Because many counties contain urban cores where large companies could easily satisfy their build-out obligations, the rural areas surrounding those urban areas would, in many cases, be left unserved with PAL spectrum.” Auctioning PALs by county “would give an insurmountable advantage to large cellular carriers such as Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Union Cellular (a regional provider serving our area),” said Lariat, a WISP. CTIA repeated support for county-sized PALs, as did the Competitive Carriers Association (see here and here).
The Advancing Innovation and Reinvigorating Widespread Access to Viable Electromagnetic Spectrum (Airwaves) Act could generate up to $2.86 billion in rural wireless broadband investments, the Competitive Carriers Association said Wednesday. The bill aims to identify spectrum for unlicensed use and free up mid-band spectrum for wireless industry purchase via a future FCC auction (see 1802070054). CCA and other telecom groups back HR-4953/S-1682, which have bipartisan support. A CCA-commissioned study, by Telecom Advisory Services, said an estimated short-term infrastructure investment of up to $2.86 billion would happen if it becomes law. Telecom Advisory Services President Raul Katz said he used in calculations the investment and economic impacts resulting from the 2016 600 MHz band incentive auction and other recent auctions, plus other recent spectrum transactions like Verizon's purchase of Straight Path, as benchmarks. “If enacted before other auctions, including the 3.5 GHz and 3.7-4.2 GHz bands, this bill could have an even greater impact,” said CCA President Steve Berry. "This study confirms that passage of the AIRWAVES Act could result in billions of additional dollars for rural broadband buildout and substantially increase GDP across various economic sectors," said Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., one of S-1682's lead sponsors, in a statement. Fellow lead S-1682 sponsor Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., said she will "keep working to move this legislation forward in order to turn the potential positive economic impact of this bill into a reality."
Paul Allen, 65, co-founder of Microsoft, died Monday from complications of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. He owned Vulcan Spectrum, which was active in the 2008 wireless spectrum auction. Allen also was an early investor in AOL and invested in Charter Communications, RCN and DreamWorks SKG. He's survived by his sister, Jody.
Executives from Midcontinent Communications gave FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr a tour Thursday of the company’s facilities in North Dakota and spoke with him about the citizens broadband radio service band and other issues. “Midco shared its views on the 2.5 GHz and 3.5 GHz bands, next generation or 5G fixed wireless technology, and Midco’s preference for county-sized spectrum licenses,” said a filing Sunday in docket 18-120. “Midco also discussed its desire for the rural bidding credits for the priority access license auction in the 3.5 GHz band.” Midco said in written testimony at a Senate hearing last week (see 1810120051) it's testing residential fixed wireless speeds of 100 Mbps download and 20 Mbps upload using 3.65 GHz and CBRS spectrum.
No one should feel entitled to citizens broadband radio service licenses, FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly told a Schools, Health & Libraries Association conference Thursday. O’Rielly told us he sees little room for additional compromise on the order headed into the Oct. 23 commissioners' meeting, though he is open to new ideas. “I’ve been working on this for a year, I’ve talked to all the parties multiple, multiple times,” O’Rielly said in an interview: “We’ve found" a place "I’m very comfortable with.” If anyone has new ideas, O’Rielly said, he will take a look.