LightSquared CEO Sanjiv Ahuja resigned Tuesday, the company said. It said Chief Network Officer Doug Smith and Chief Financial Officer Marc Montagner will be co-chief operating officers while LightSquared seeks a new CEO. Ahuja, who will continue as chairman of LightSquared’s board, won’t be “taking a new position but focusing on his other business interests,” said a spokesman for Ahuja. LightSquared said it added Phil Falcone, CEO of Harbinger, LightSquared’s biggest investor, to the board. LightSquared is “committed to working with the appropriate entities to find a solution to the recent regulatory issues,” Falcone said in a news release. LightSquared “is also taking an aggressive approach to its finances to ensure that it has adequate financial runway while it works through these issues,” it said. The FCC recently said it would move to block LightSquared’s terrestrial service authorization.
Because many small cable operators plan to go all-digital in coming years, the American Cable Association asked the FCC to let such companies use refurbished set-top boxes without separate security and navigation features. Adams Cable Equipment has sought a waiver of CableCARD rules to sell integrated boxes with advanced services, something TiVo has opposed. ACA said members “would be disproportionately affected by the conditions compared to larger operators” under the agency’s proposal for ways cable operators can make customers whole when the companies encrypt programming in all-digital systems. Of 107 ACA companies that responded to a December survey by the group, 50 percent plan to either “operate a QAM-based all digital system, or will be upgrading to all-digital within three years,” the association said in a filing. Makers of consumer electronics that use unencrypted clear QAM signals to get shows on the basic cable tier have asked the agency not to allow encrypting. The Media Bureau is working on an order that would make scrambling OK for operators that provide free set-tops, CableCARDs or other CE gear to some customers (CD Feb 28 p18). ACA wants the FCC to let operators with fewer than 400,001 subscribers deploy “the most inexpensive” set-tops “available on the market,” lessening the commission’s proposed encryption rules “consumer protection measures” that small operators would otherwise face, Monday’s filing said. “The Commission can provide smaller and larger providers with an equal incentive to take advantage of the benefits of basic tier encryption if, after taking these factors into account, it adopts an alternative set of conditions for smaller operators that will reduce the costs of moving to basic tier encryption,” the filing in docket 11-169 said (http://xrl.us/bmwcr6) about ACA’s meeting with Chief Bill Lake and others in the bureau’s front office. “The impact of [ACA’s] proposal on the development of a marketplace for retail set-top boxes would be de minimis, particularly if the Commission permits the deployment of refurbished integrated set-top boxes solely for the purpose of satisfying the conditions contained in the proposed basic tier encryption waiver."
A conference hosted by the German government in Berlin is considering the adoption of “a protocol to the Convention on International Interests in Mobile Equipment on Matters specific to Space Assets,” the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT) website said. Under the protocol, which is opposed by nearly 100 satellite entities, space objects must be identified on an international registry, to create and protect an international interest in them, a December letter from the industry group said (CD Dec 16 p10). The German Federal Foreign Office has not responded to repeated queries this week on press access to a diplomatic conference through March 9. The U.S. is concerned that a registration system developed under a World Radiocommunication Conference agenda item earlier this month could expand (CD Feb 16 p16). The ITU Council last year considered the idea of the organization becoming the supervisory authority for the registry. Francois Rancy, the Radiocommunication Bureau director, and Yvon Henri, chief of the ITU Space Services Department, are attending the meeting.
The FCC ordered 16 Class A TV stations to “show cause” why their authorization shouldn’t be changed to a regular low-power station. Class A broadcasters have primary spectrum use status under the 1999 Community Broadcasters Protection Act, but the stations at issue hadn’t made some required filings nor responded to requests from the Media Bureau for those documents, said bureau letters released Tuesday (http://xrl.us/bmrnz7). They gave the broadcasters until March 30 to “file a written statement why the above-captioned license should not be modified as proposed.” The stations are licensed to cities including Austin, Corpus Christi, Lubbock, Victoria, Robstown and San Antonio, Texas; Springfield, Mo.; and Burlington, Monkton and Newport, Vt.
Loral Space and Communications CEO Michael Targoff resigned from ViaSat’s board Friday, said a ViaSat SEC filing (http://xrl.us/bmwcm9). ViaSat recently filed a breach of contract and patent infringement lawsuit against Space Systems/Loral (CD Feb 6 p4), a subsidiary of Loral.
The FCC Wireline Bureau clarified certain rules adopted in its Universal Service Fund/intercarrier compensation order, in an order released Monday. It said the ability to charge under the VoIP symmetry tariffing provision in Section 61.26(f) is limited by Section 51.913(b), which “does not permit a local exchange carrier to charge for functions not performed by the local exchange carrier itself or the affiliated or unaffiliated provider of interconnected VoIP service or non-interconnected VoIP service.” The clarification came in response to a letter from YMax, the company that sells the MagicJack VoIP product, asking if the rules permit a competitive LEC to tariff and charge the full benchmark rate level even if it includes functions that neither it nor its VoIP retail partner actually provide. The bureau also clarified a high-cost support provision, in response to Verizon Wireless uncertainty about whether the rules superseded a prior merger commitment. “Verizon Wireless will receive support in 2012 based on its merger commitments, as clarified by the Corr Wireless Order, not based on the general phase down of competitive ETC support described in the USF/ICC Transformation Order,” the bureau said. It dismissed in part a petition for reconsideration filed by USTelecom, which asked for clarification that reductions in legacy support resulting from a failure to meet the urban rate floor would extend only to high-cost loop support and high-cost model support. The order had already addressed the issue, the bureau said, ruling that “support reductions associated with the rate floor will offset frozen CAF Phase I support only to the extent that the recipient’s frozen CAF Phase I support replaced HCLS and HCMS."
A four-year investigation of Epic Touch ended Monday, the FCC Enforcement Bureau said, finding the company demonstrated it was in compliance with hearing aid compatibility rules(http://xrl.us/bmwcgo). The bureau investigated whether Epic deployed digital wireless hearing-aid compatible handsets in accordance with Section 20.19(d)(2) of the commission’s rules. “Based on information recently provided by Epic Touch, regarding its handset offerings, we conclude that Epic Touch has demonstrated that it was in compliance during the requisite period,” the bureau said. The information provided was a letter from Epic’s counsel explaining that a comprehensive review of the company’s sales records revealed additional handset offerings not previously reported to the FCC. The company submitted point of sale and inventory statements to show compliance. Epic agreed to contribute $22,500 to the U.S. Treasury, and develop and implement a compliance plan to ensure future rule compliance.
The FCC should “first address the backlog of pending translator applications” made in 2003 “to identify those that are still viable and propose a bona fide service,” in implementing the 2010 Local Community Radio Act (LCRA), NPR said. “The Commission could significantly reduce the overall number of pending applications, and accommodate engineering solutions and settlements to facilitate such service to a greater degree and without obstructing new” low-power FM service by issuing construction permits for translators on that band, NPR said. It’s concerned about possible interference to public radio stations if the commission waives a requirement that LPFM outlets be at least two-notches away on the dial from full-power FM, NPR said. “The granting of such waivers should occur under very limited circumstances and only after a very rigorous process as required under the LCRA.” The NAB has made a similar request, after the Media Bureau circulated a draft rulemaking notice about second-adjacent separation waivers (CD Feb 9 p6). NPR executives met with an aide to Commissioner Robert McDowell, a Monday filing in docket 99-25 said (http://xrl.us/bmwci4).
CTIA and representatives of member companies discussed interference concerns for carriers holding licenses in the 700 MHz A, B and C blocks, in a meeting with FCC Wireless Bureau Chief Rick Kaplan and others from the bureau. “CTIA highlighted these interference issues in the context of its 2011 Petition for Rulemaking and Request for Licensing Freezes on applications for television broadcast stations on Channel 51,” said an ex parte filing (http://xrl.us/bmwcd7). “The parties also raised the Commission’s upcoming interoperability proceeding as relevant to these interference concerns."
General Communications Inc. faces “significant challenges” complying with new call signaling rules adopted by the FCC as part of its Universal Service Fund/intercarrier compensation order, GCI said. It seeks a waiver to avoid “unnecessary disruption to existing practices,” said a petition filed Monday (http://xrl.us/bmwcdv). GCI, which serves Alaskan incumbent LECs, said the state’s unique challenges have forced it to implement “case-by-case solutions that, in some cases, arguably contradict the letter -- but not the spirit -- of the new call signaling rules.” GCI wants a waiver to let it continue reselling long distance service, continue manipulating the Charge Number field to assist in accurate billing, and continue using multifrequency and dual tone multifrequency signaling practices to let it comply with industry standards that permit it to keep calling party number data private. GCI also supported Verizon’s request that the commission reconsider its decision not to adopt technical feasibility or industry standards exceptions to the rules, the petition said.