Cambridge Consultants was selected by Iridium to lead subscriber equipment technology development for the Iridium NEXT constellation. Cambridge also will “provide input into the broader satellite and ground infrastructure system design upon which Iridium NEXT is being built,” Cambridge said in a news release (http://xrl.us/bn4on5). Cambridge will begin the construction of prototype communications equipment “that will be used to verify the design and performance of the Iridium NEXT system prior to the anticipated start of full construction in 2013,” it said.
CEA and Public Knowledge each opposed Charter’s request for a waiver of the FCC’s CableCARD rules. Charter asked the agency last month for permission to lease set-top boxes with built-in security features while it upgrades its network to handle a downloadable security system for pay-TV programming (CD Nov 5 p10). But even Charter’s downloadable security plans would fail to meet FCC requirements because they include a hardware component to the system -- a chip that must be installed and programmed at the factory -- CEA said. “It is of no consequence that a particular chip is available for license, even on the most advantageous terms, if (1) other cable operators do not use the system that requires it and (2) it does not employ technology that is actually portable across operators,” the CEA said (http://xrl.us/bn4omm). “Except for nomenclature and secondary detail, there is no effective difference between the system for which Charter seeks a waiver and the full integration of conditional access technology,” it said. Instead the FCC should start a new rulemaking on the issue, the CEA said. “The time has come for the FCC to identify a successor common interface that affords device access to all MVPD services,” it said. Public Knowledge echoed some of CEA’s concerns but said it would support CableCARD waivers for cable operators introducing “standards-based home video gateways.” Such deployments could help pave the way for AllVid, it said (http://xrl.us/bn4oms).
The iPhone 5 will ship in South Korea Friday and more than 50 additional countries are being added this month, Apple said Monday. The additional markets include Brazil, Russia and Taiwan, it said. China is getting the iPhone 5 Dec. 14, Apple said Friday. The iPhone 5 is already available in 47 countries including the U.S., Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan and the U.K., it said.
The State Department opposed North Korea’s planned rocket launch of a satellite. Such a launch “would be a highly provocative act that threatens peace and security in the region,” a State Department spokeswoman said in a statement. “Any North Korean launch using ballistic missile technology is in direct violation of U.N. Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1874.” The department urged the North Korean government, which announced it would launch the rocket between Dec. 10 and 22, to put a satellite into space, to comply fully with its obligations under the relevant resolutions, it said.
NAB expanded on its defense of joint services agreements, which it again asked the FCC not to attribute under coming media ownership rules. A draft order would deem TV JSAs attributable when 15 percent or more of a station’s ad time is brokered by a separately owned broadcaster in the same market (CD Nov 29 p5). Docket 09-182 (http://xrl.us/bn4ojq) doesn’t support such a change, and nor should the quadrennial media ownership review order be used to consider other joint TV stations’ sharing arrangements, NAB executives reported in the docket telling Commissioner Ajit Pai. It would be “anticompetitive and fundamentally unfair to prevent” stations but not pay-TV rivals from selling “advertising time jointly,” the association said of multichannel video programming distributors, and in 100 markets an MVPD has a more than 40 percent share of all subscribers paying for TV. MVPDs and public interest groups have asked the agency to attribute other deals besides only TV JSAs. The agency shouldn’t “further complicate this proceeding with complex and distinct retransmission consent issues extraneous to the statutorily mandated review of the broadcast ownership rules,” NAB said (http://xrl.us/bn4okp). To ex-Commissioner Michael Copps, the draft order resembles rules approved in 2007 under a Republican-led commission, he wrote Sunday on the blog of the Benton Foundation, which is among the nonprofit groups opposing ownership deregulation. “Are we back in 2007?” he asked (http://xrl.us/bn4ok3). “Shockingly, the new proposal goes even beyond the 2007 proceeding by actually permitting more radio-TV consolidation, too.” Copps, who dissented from the 2007 rules, now works for Common Cause, which like Benton opposes ownership deregulation.
Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) said it will sell its optical networking unit to Marlin Equity Partners, in another effort to cut costs and refocus on wireless broadband. The deal will “give both businesses the opportunity to concentrate investment and strategic focus on their core segments,” NSN said in a news release. The company did not release financial details of the transaction (http://xrl.us/bn4oe9). Marlin’s purchase of the optical networking business may not mean the firm intends to turn it around, research firm Ovum said Monday. “Competition in the market is keen; margins are under constant pressure,” said Dana Cooperson, leader of Ovum’s network infrastructure telecoms team in a statement. “Competitors will take advantage of this ownership change and related confusion to gain any advantage in NSN’s accounts. Marlin’s goal may be to sell the optical business to another vendor, for example Juniper Networks."
House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services Chair Jo Ann Emerson, R-Mo., will retire in February to become CEO of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, her spokesman said Monday. In the 112th Congress Emerson removed a provision in the House financial services and general government appropriations bill for FY2013 that would have stripped funding for the FCC’s political file disclosure rule (CD June 21 p2).
Representatives of Viaero Wireless shared complaints about the FCC’s Mobility Fund Phase I auction during meetings at the commission last week. “Viaero noted that the time between the public notice announcing the census tracts available for bid and the short-form filing deadline was short, making it difficult to conduct initial due diligence on hundreds of tracts,” the carrier said in a filing at the commission (http://xrl.us/bn4ocp). “Moreover, the time between the public notice following the auction and the long-form filing deadline was also short, making it difficult to put together build plans and budgets once auction results were learned.” Viaero, which was formerly N.E. Colorado Cellular, also said the line of credit required by the FCC to participate in the auction was “a significant burden for small business because obtaining a commitment letter required as much due diligence as obtaining the letter of credit. ... Without an existing facility with sufficient available credit, Viaero would probably not have had time to refinance. Alternatives to the letter of credit requirement should be explored."
34 senators from states with rural telephone customers urged FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski in a letter sent Monday to investigate telephone service providers who they said are failing to properly complete calls to customers in rural areas. Rural consumers are experiencing calls that “fail to complete, are delayed, have poor voice quality, lack correct caller ID information, or are never connected,” the letter said. Such call connection problems are “continuing to occur at an alarming rate,” the senators said, urging the FCC to take action against any parties that violate the FCC’s 2012 Declaratory Ruling on Rural Call Completion Issues. The senators also urged the commission to determine whether originating providers are employing least-cost routing services, which the letter said could be a contributing factor to call connection problems. The letter was signed by Sens. Tim Johnson, D-S.D.; Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa; John Thune, R-S.D.; Al Franken, D-Minn.; Pat Leahy, D-Vt.; Bernard Sanders, I-Vt.; Tom Harkin, D-Iowa; Ben Nelson, D-Neb.; Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.; Jon Tester, D-Mont.; Jeff Merkley, D-Ore.; John Barrasso, R-Wyo.; Max Baucus, D-Mont.; Barbara Boxer, D-Calif.; Michael Enzi, R-Wyo.; Kent Conrad, D-N.D.; Michael Bennet, D-Colo.; James Inhofe, R-Okla.; John Hoeven, R-N.D.; Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.; Dick Durbin, D-Ill.; Tom Udall, D-N.M.; Herb Kohl, D-Wis.; Mark Kirk, R-Ill.; Mike Johanns, R-Neb.; Orrin Hatch, R-Utah; Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich.; John Boozman, R-Ark.; Carl Levin, D-Mich.; Mark Udall, D-Colo.; Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M.; Mark Pryor, D-Ark.; Ron Wyden, D-Ore.; and Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. It’s “unacceptable” that households and small businesses are not receiving calls, said OPASTCO Vice President-Legislative Policy Randy Tyree, in a separate news release. Western Telecommunications Alliance Executive Vice President Kelly Worthington urged the FCC to “crack down immediately” on providers who aren’t completing calls, in another news release. “This is a public safety issue, a consumer issue, a business issue and a health care issue,” she said. The FCC had no comment.
The Minority Media and Telecommunications Council is selling KYHN(AM) Fort Smith, Ark., to Kim Girdner and Kim Media LLC, MMTC said of the station donated to the group in 2009 by Clear Channel (CD July 22/09 p9). The station will have a news-talk program format, and the family buying it recently won in an FCC auction a construction permit for what’s going to become KXMX(FM) Sallisaw, Okla., MMTC said in a Sunday email.