FORT LAUDERDALE -- The extent of small carrier bidding in the TV incentive auction remains an open question, with the bidding to start March 29, industry officials said at the Competitive Carriers Association annual meeting, which closed Friday. The FCC plans to set aside 30 MHz of “reserve” spectrum in many markets for companies without significant low-band spectrum holdings in that market.

Sprint’s decision to sit out the TV incentive auction, after lobbying hard for a spectrum reserve, teaches a valuable lesson, Free State Foundation President Randolph May said Wednesday in a blog post. “The foremost lesson is one I have tried to hammer home for many years,” May wrote. “Absent a true market failure -- and there is not one with respect to the marketplace for broadband services, including wireless services, the Commission needs to quit trying to manage competition.” May’s comments miss the point of Sprint’s advocacy, Larry Krevor, vice president-legal and government affairs-spectrum, said in an email. “Yes, Sprint supported strengthening the spectrum reserve, along with virtually the entire wireless communications industry, other than Verizon and AT&T,” he said. But the record makes clear Sprint’s focus was on persuading the FCC to minimize the “impairment” 600 MHz winners would suffer from remaining TV broadcast operations, Krevor said. “Sprint’s efforts helped the Commission improve the quality of the auctioned spectrum, thereby producing better spectrum for all auction participants to bid on and higher auction revenues.”

FORT LAUDERDALE -- Competitive carriers view the guidance offered by the FCC Tuesday evening (see 1510060058) on business practices during the quiet period around the TV incentive auction as mostly positive, industry officials at the Competitive Carriers Association convention told us Wednesday. The FCC has faced recurring questions about the quiet period, which starts when companies file short-form applications to bid in the auction (see 1508130043). Carriers have warned a prolonged quiet period could have a “chilling effect” on how they do business. Broadcasters, meanwhile, had some praise for the guidance, though it could hurt small law firms (see 1510070082).

Sprint’s decision not to participate in the TV incentive auction raises big questions about the FCC’s decision to restrict bidding on parts of the spectrum to just competitive carriers, said Charles Golvin of Abelian Research on a webinar Monday sponsored by Recon Analytics. Golvin and other analysts discussed big recent trends in the wireless sector, including the changing nature of AT&T, as it becomes more than a traditional carrier.

Sprint’s announcement that it won't participate in the TV incentive auction (see 1509280059) shows the Department of Justice was dead wrong in urging the FCC to devise rules for the auction that would guarantee Sprint and T-Mobile came away with spectrum, said Fred Campbell, executive director of the Center for Boundless Innovation in Technology, Thursday in a blog post on the RedState webpage. “Though it’s no surprise, it’s now obvious the country’s federal experts on competition and antitrust matters were wrong in their analysis of Sprint’s alleged need for low-frequency spectrum in order to compete,” he said. A Sprint spokesman responded in an email: “Sprint’s decision to not participate in the 600 MHz Incentive Auction provides no basis for critiquing the FCC’s public policy decisions in establishing the incentive auction structure, rules and procedures... Throughout these proceedings, Sprint consistently advocated for an auction structure with the best chance of promoting competition and thereby spurring wireless broadband innovation and benefiting consumers. The FCC’s auction decisions reflect a fair balancing of these goals along with other public policy considerations in a truly innovative and complex undertaking.”

Sprint said it won't take part in the TV incentive auction, becoming the first major player to announce it will definitely sit it out. Industry officials said Monday that the Sprint announcement Saturday raises new questions for the FCC, but wasn't a surprise. The departure of Sprint could also be a net win for T-Mobile and other competitive carriers that now have a clear path to buy the 30 MHz of reserve spectrum set aside for providers with significant low-band holdings in what is expected to be a large number of markets, industry observers said.

AT&T officials explained in more detail the kind of work carriers must do after they buy licenses in the TV incentive auction, in a teleconference with FCC officials, said a filing in docket 12-268. AT&T elaborated on its “First Field Application” (FFA) testing practices, the filing said. “FFA testing is part of a process that necessarily takes place before any new hardware or software is introduced into AT&T’s network, and is especially important prior to introducing a new spectrum band into the network,” the carrier said. “Its FFA process typically follows lab testing by its vendors, then testing in AT&T’s own labs ... [T]hat testing in a live network environment is essential.” CTIA and members have been pressing the FCC to put in place “commencement of service” rules that give licensees the time they need to conduct tests as they get ready to deploy on the 600 MHz licenses they buy in the auction (see 1509230043). “Software testing is especially complex, and includes tests to ensure that the software load is stable, that all features work and that all of the peg counters are operating properly,” AT&T said, noting that problems are identified as tests take place. “Device testing includes evaluations of how the devices interoperate with the hardware and software in the new band as well as in the other bands operating on the network, and is evaluated in various morphologies.”

Getting the rules right on when operations start after a wireless company buys a license in the TV incentive auction is critical, CTIA said in meetings on the eighth floor at the FCC. The wireless association recommended that the FCC find that operations “commence” when the licensee begins either market or site commissioning tests, which CTIA said is a compromise proposal. Under that definition “low-power television and unlicensed users of the UHF band will be able to remain in operation in the 600 MHz band even after it is reallocated and licensed to others, while 600 MHz licensees will gain access to their licensed spectrum as necessary to ‘commence service,’ including the pre-requisite market and commissioning testing steps that must precede a commercial launch,” CTIA said. Secondary users could continue to “utilize the mobile wireless band in the vast majority of areas beyond the market testing stage, until pre-commercial launch testing necessitates the use of the mobile wireless band for mobile wireless service.” CTIA officials met with staff from the offices of commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel, Ajit Pai and Mike O’Rielly, CTIA said in a filing posted in docket 12-268.

NAB is right to question the FCC decision to place broadcasters in the duplex gap following the TV incentive auction, wireless mic company Sennheiser commented in docket 12-268, responding to NAB’s petition for reconsideration of auction procedures (see 1509110050). “Wireless microphones require clear, reliable channels in frequencies with good propagation characteristics (i.e. the TV bands and 600 MHz spectrum),” Sennheiser said. “Given the sensitivity of wireless microphone receivers and their real-time operational requirements, sharing spectrum with white space devices undermines the utility of spectrum for wireless microphone operations.” Some uses of the mics, including breaking news, film production, concerts and theater and “historic political and civic events” in particular, “require hyper-critical links for when there is no ‘second chance,’” the company said in a filing posted Monday.

Sprint still hasn't decided whether it will participate in next year’s TV incentive auction, Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure said at a Goldman Sachs financial conference Thursday. But Claure said he sees the value of the 600 MHz spectrum as limited and said it will take years for successful bidders to build out the licenses sold in the auction.