The FCC Enforcement Bureau ordered Fabrice Polynice to pay a $25,000 fine for operating an unlicensed radio station on the frequency 90.1 MHz in North Miami, Fla. Polynice operated the station “on six different days during March to July 2012 from three different locations in North Miami,” the bureau said in an order (http://bit.ly/XX7F3f). The bureau found Polynice’s claim “that someone else operated the unlicensed broadcast radio station unconvincing,” it said. In a separate order, the bureau also ordered Thomas Costa to pay $1,200 for operating radio transmitting equipment on the frequency 87.9 MHz in Iowa City, Iowa, without commission authorization, it said (http://bit.ly/XXbENp). The bureau reduced the fine from the originally proposed amount of $10,000, it said. “Based on the financial documents provided by Mr. Costa, we find sufficient basis to reduce the forfeiture to $1,200.” The bureau proposed a $10,000 fine for Romayne Davis, who allegedly operated an unlicensed radio transmitter on the frequency 89.5 MHz in Oakland Park, Fla., it said in a notice of apparent liability (http://bit.ly/ZiBRrC). A review of the FCC’s records revealed that no license or authorization “was issued to Mr. Davis or to anyone else to operate a radio station on 89.5 MHz at this location,” it said.
The FCC’s first reverse auction for USF monies last September under its new Mobility Fund must be considered a “qualified success,” Technology Policy Institute Vice President Scott Wallsten said in a paper released Friday. “Perhaps most importantly, it demonstrated that the FCC can run an effective reverse auction and demonstrated that allocating subsidies based on cost-effectiveness measures has the potential to dramatically increase the bang for the buck we get from universal service expenditures,” said Wallsten, a former FCC economist. Under the auction, the FCC ordered bids from lowest to highest based on dollars per road-mile covered and then granted awards until it reached its budget constraint of $300 million. “The results demonstrate how much more of a ‘bang for the buck’ it is possible to get when subsidies are ordered by cost-effectiveness rather than simply provided in all possible eligible areas,” the paper said (http://bit.ly/Z6Et5S). “By ordering subsidies in terms of cost-effectiveness, $300 million covered 83,500 road miles. Based on bids received in areas that were ultimately not awarded funding, covering the next 1,924 miles would have required an additional $144 million in subsidies.” It’s still unclear the extent to which the auction will mean service is ultimately rolled out to unserved areas, Wallsten wrote. “While this exercise demonstrated that the FCC can run an effective reverse auction, it also yields certain lessons,” the paper said. “Most notably, the auction highlighted the potential difficulty in generating participation. The FCC handled this problem well, but must continue to think hard about how to encourage participation in upcoming reverse auctions, most notably on the broadcaster side of the Incentive Auctions."
Correction: The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling in favor of Cablevision on its remote-storage DVR service was the decision Dish Network Deputy General Counsel Jeff Blum called “absolutely critical” for pay-TV providers (CD April 5 p9).
The FCC International Bureau granted special temporary authority licenses to Intelsat, Iridium and SES Americom. Intelsat obtained an STA for 30 days to conduct telemetry, tracking and command operations to drift the Intelsat 5 satellite from 169 degrees east orbital location to 65.45 degrees east, the bureau said in a public notice (http://fcc.us/14JEeoa). The STA pertains to center frequencies, including 14.498 GHz and 13.999 GHz and 11.451 GHz, it said. The bureau granted Iridium a 180-day STA “to continue to operate three space stations in its non-geostationary orbit constellation,” it said. A 60-day STA for SES will allow SES to operate AMC-5 at 80.85 degrees west, rather than 80.90 degrees west, the bureau said.
Law firm K&L Gates has looked more closely at who owns Sprint Nextel common stock and determined that at least 75 percent is owned by U.S. shareholders. Sprint filed a report by the firm (http://bit.ly/16Bw27P) as part of the docket on the Sprint/SoftBank transaction. Japan’s SoftBank hopes to buy 70 percent of Sprint for $20 billion, but the FCC and other regulators must sign off on the transaction. Friday was day 126 of the FCC’s review of the deal.
Any measurable goals and targets for a development agenda after the 2015 deadline for reaching the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) “should explicitly include broadband,” the four leaders of the U.N. Broadband Commission said in an open letter on behalf of the group’s 55 commissioners (http://xrl.us/bos6rh). The group is chaired by telecom magnate Carlos Slim Helu and embattled Rwandan President Paul Kagame. Hamadoun Toure, the ITU secretary-general, and Irina Bokova of the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, are the vice-chairs. The deadline for reaching the goals expires in 1,000 days, the letter said. A high-level panel, mandated by a 2010 summit on the MDG, will advise the U.N. secretary-general on the global development framework beyond 2015. Broadband, including mobile broadband, is fundamental for ensuring connectivity at sea and in the air, as well as on land in remote areas, it said. Broadband will also spur emergency and humanitarian communications, distance learning and e-commerce, it said. Broadband enhances remote diagnosis, tracking of symptoms, mapping epidemics and disease outbreaks, it said. Furthermore, broadband promotes increased opportunities for women and girls to participate in economic and social activities, it said. There is a need for a renewed global partnership that enables a transformative, people-centered and planet-sensitive development agenda, the high-level panel advising the U.N. secretary general said following a March 27 meeting (http://xrl.us/bos6r6). The Broadband Commission’s members include Vint Cerf of Google, Julius Genachowski of the FCC, Neelie Kroes of the European Commission, executives from major telecom and satellite companies, Microsoft, Cisco, Qualcomm, Huawei and others.
The Epix cable channel got added pay-TV distribution on Hawaiian Telcom, said the telco that also sells video. The content can be seen “both inside and away from home through EpixHD.com and EPIX apps available on hundreds of devices including popular smartphones, game consoles, and streaming media players,” said a Hawaiian Telcom news release Wednesday. The Epix joint venture of Lionsgate, MGM Studios and Viacom is in more than 30 million homes, the channel said. Carriage is limited to only some U.S. pay-TV companies (CD April 2 p11).
“M&A in the television broadcast space is far from over,” with assets worth $2.5 billion to $3 billion “on the market or likely to come to market soon,” wrote an industry analyst of mergers and acquisitions. Wachovia’s Marci Ryvicker also said streaming broadcast-TV service Aereo may not much affect station owner Nexstar, which had no comment for our report. After meeting with the CEO and chief financial officer of Nexstar, Ryvicker said the company “is eyeing another round of acquisitions” worth $300 million to $500 million. Nexstar “has three big retrans years right around the corner,” the analyst wrote investors, speaking of retransmission consent fees in 2014 to 2016. “BIG question marks” loom for the company on Aereo, a streaming service broadcasters have sued to block, said Ryvicker. “Even if Aereo wins the copyright suit,” which Nexstar executives believe won’t likely happen, “this only impacts the surrounding NYC area,” where that streaming company is serving subscribers with local TV stations’ programming, she wrote Wednesday: “There is enough precedence (i.e. FilmON) to suggest Aereo won’t ’spread,'” and Nexstar “is in small markets which are out of Aereo’s ‘crosshairs.'” The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday upheld a district court’s decision not to issue an injunction against Aereo, which was the subject of an FCBA event Wednesday. (See separate report above in this issue.)
Gray Television filed a carriage complaint against Nebraska cable operator Applied Communications Technology because the operator declined to carry KSNB-TV Superior. According to the documents filed with the FCC’s Media Bureau Thursday, Applied Communications Technology has said it would have trouble receiving KSNB’s signal. Gray said it has adequate power and seven translators to deliver the signal, and commits to buying and installing any additional equipment necessary. The complaint said the FCC “has repeatedly held that a cable operator cannot refuse to carry a television station that agrees to purchase and install at its own expense the equipment necessary to deliver an adequate signal to the operator’s headend.” Applied Communications Technology didn’t comment. In an email to Gray filed with the complaint, a representative of the operator wrote that it “would need to discuss another way to get [KSNB’s] signal to deliver to our customer base. We will gladly discuss those options when it is convenient with your company.”
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and European Commission Vice President Viviane Reding discussed how the U.S. and European Union can work together to better “protect children against online predators” among other topics, said a statement released by the Justice Department Thursday. “Both Attorney General Holder and Vice President Reding also noted the important role that Eurojust, the European Union’s Judicial Cooperation Unit, has taken in coordinating highly successful multilateral investigations, including investigations of online child predators."