FCC Approves Rules for Spectrum Sharing in 3.5 GHz Band

“Today’s action adds 100 megahertz of spectrum newly available for wireless broadband to the 50 megahertz of spectrum already available for commercial use in that band, a significant step towards meeting the nation’s 500 megahertz goal,” the FCC said in a news release. The order has yet to be released.

The order establishes a three-tiered access and sharing model comprising federal and nonfederal incumbents, priority access licensees (PALs) in the 3550-3650 GHz part of the band and general authorized access (GAA) users, officials said. The GAA tier is to provide more spectrum for Wi-Fi and other unlicensed use on channels not being used by higher-priority users. The priority access tier is to be made available through auction, though a bidder may buy no more than four PALs in a given market, officials said.

One or more privately operated Spectrum Access Systems (SAS) will control sharing in the band, officials said. The order has been years in development, with the FCC approving its initial NPRM in 2012 (see 1212130044). FCC officials said the further notice seeks comment on three issues -- additional protection criteria for in-band and out-of-band fixed satellite service earth stations, appropriate secondary market rules and how to define whether PALs are in use at a particular location.

Commissioners Mike O’Rielly and Ajit Pai voted for the order, though with partial concurrences, expressing concerns about some of the policy calls made by the agency. Both said the order had moved in a positive direction since it was circulated by Chairman Tom Wheeler three weeks ago.

O’Rielly questioned whether auctioning the PALs for three-year terms will lead to a “meaningful incentive to entice auction participants.” O’Rielly said he had hoped the rules would include a mechanism “whereby any entity could receive a PAL even if mutually exclusive applications, which are necessary to trigger an auction, are not filed in a particular census tract.” He also said the GAA tier should be administered under the Part 15 rules that have worked well in other unlicensed bands, not a new Part 96 regime, which is created by the order.

“Some people talk about the structure set up in this item as a new paradigm for future spectrum policy,” O’Rielly said. “It is premature to declare this a new paradigm, and I am not convinced that it is.”

Pai said exclusion zones in the order, designed to protect Navy radars, are still too large. “This order leaves many important details and complex questions to be resolved, including whether technologies will develop that can manage the complicated and dynamic interference scenarios that will result from our approach,” Pai said. “It therefore remains to be seen whether we can turn today’s spectrum theory into a working reality.” Pai cautioned it could take years for consumers to realize any benefits from the 3.5 GHz band.

But Wheeler and Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel called the order a big step forward for the FCC. “Today, we make history,” Rosenworcel said. “We chart a new course for spectrum policy.”

Clyburn said she would have preferred that the FCC ask questions in the further notice about LTE-U. “I remember all too well the significant problem with the lack of interoperability in the 700 MHz band that developed in the industry standard setting process after Auction No. 73,” she said. “Considerable time and effort was necessary to repair that technical impediment resulting in spectrum remaining unused and investment being stranded.”

The FCC is seeking input on LTE-U in a PN to be released shortly, Wheeler said. The FCC still has lots to learn on the issue, especially since the standard is still being developed, Wheeler said after the meeting. “How that interrelates with our spectrum activities, writ large, is an important question,” he said. “What we want to do in the PN is say, ‘Okay, this is not yet a standard, but what are the issues that are being developed in the standards process? How are those going to relate to policy … issues that we have to deal with?’” Wheeler also praised the Defense Department for its work on the order.

Carriers Have Questions

Carrier executives told us they continue to have many questions about the viability of the 3.5 GHz band. The FCC improved the order significantly after it was circulated, a carrier executive said. “We’ll see how it all plays out,” the executive said. Some of the biggest questions include how the SAS will work and the kinds of controls it has. Issues teed up in the further notice, or otherwise left for future decision, present the most concerns, the source said.

A wireless industry lawyer said many carriers aren't finding the band to be a “terribly appealing prospect” at this point. “It’s a big departure from how we’ve done spectrum in the past, specifically with much shorter license terms and no renewal expectancy.” Some carriers are saying “we hope this is not a model for going forward,” the lawyer said. The FCC has even equivocated on whether the PALs offered will be similar to traditional exclusive-use licenses, the lawyer said. “If the carriers lose that battle as well this 3.5 [GHz] proceeding could be a failed experiment.”

The FCC should make the band “as investment-friendly as possible as well as ensure this spectrum plays a meaningful role in improving the speed and capacity for consumers’ mobile services,” said a blog post by CTIA Vice President-Regulatory Affairs Scott Bergmann. “To facilitate certainty and deployment in this band, the FCC should give carriers confidence that the spectrum needed will be available when it’s needed, including rejecting calls for opportunistic sharing of priority spectrum, dynamic frequency assignments and technology-specific mandates.”

“The Commission has taken an innovative approach in the band to facilitate spectrum sharing with incumbent government user,” AT&T said in a statement Friday.

“While exclusive licensing will persist for many years, there is little left to be cleared for traditional auctions,” said Michael Calabrese, director of the New America Foundation’s Wireless Future Project. “There is, however, a potential spectrum superhighway of grossly underused federal and satellite spectrum that needs to be opened for low-power sharing by both unlicensed users and by priority access licensees who pay for interference protection.”

"Just as the smartphone of today is light years more advanced than the primitive touchtone phones of 1982, the citizen’s broadband radio service represents a technological advancement light years beyond its ancient CB radio ancestor featured in ‘Smokey and the Bandit,'" Public Knowledge Senior Vice President Harold Feld said. “Today’s FCC’s actions lay the groundwork for changes in the very way we use wireless, allowing different levels of interference protection and network architecture that will make the wireless world of the future as radically different as the smartphone and the WiFi hotspot are from touchtone phones and the CB radios."