The FCC Wireless Bureau on Tuesday announced the grant of two long-form applications and issuance of nine licenses to Quick Current purchased in the 2.5 GHz auction. The licenses are in Iowa and Nebraska.

Driven by 5G, technology is changing how all industries conduct business and companies must adjust, speakers said during a keynote panel Tuesday at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. “Technology is driving massive changes across multiple industries,” said Mohamed Kande, vice chair PwC US and the firm's global chairman-elect. How, when and where companies operate, what their biggest products are and how they serve customers are all changing, he said. “No one is spared,” he said. Kande noted that 65% of the companies on the Fortune Global 500 list in 1995 no longer exist -- they either got acquired or went bankrupt. PwC recently surveyed global CEOs, 45% of whom said their businesses won’t be viable in 10 years, Kande added. Companies have to “reinvent” their business models, he said. “It is not about doing the same thing” or “about becoming more efficient,” he said: Change is about “how companies make money differently, how they serve their customers in new ways, get into new products and services and even new industries.” A big force for change is 5G, which will make the IoT “a reality,” Kande said. “Think about all the data and insights that come out of 5G for companies to run their businesses better,” he said. We will see “an explosion of the cloud” because of how 5G is being deployed, and that will mean more reliance on AI, he predicted. Step one is being connected, said Antonio Neri, CEO of Hewlett Packard Enterprise. “Without connectivity, you can’t digitize, you can’t automate … and you can’t deliver these new experiences” for customers, he said. Neri said Hewlett Packard made a “big bet” on investing on the network edge. Companies can’t put all their data in the same location, whether on premises or in the cloud, he said. “We decided to build a hybrid cloud experience with the cloud principles in mind,” he said. For most companies, data is “the most valuable asset” they have, and at some point companies will have to report their owned data in financial balance sheets, he said. AI is “the next big inflection point” for the internet, predicted Rami Rahim, CEO of Juniper Networks. Companies need “bold thinking” to capture all the potential AI offers, he said.

While the wireless industry largely supported recommendations in an FCC NPRM on implementing a 100% hearing-aid compatibility (HAC) requirement for wireless handset models, groups representing the deaf and hard of hearing urged tweaks. Commissioners approved the NPRM in December (see 2312130019) and comments were posted this week in docket 23-388. The Hearing Loss Association of America led other groups in urging that the FCC adopt “a forward-looking, flexible definition of hearing aid compatibility that reflects changing technologies.” The FCC should adopt a definition of Bluetooth connectivity “that rests on a set of functional requirements” ensuring HAC compatibility “via Bluetooth … designed to achieve effective HAC use in the widest number of scenarios possible,” the groups said. They called for “an expanded definition of hearing aid compatibility to include Bluetooth connectivity along with telecoil connectivity,” which “does not rely solely on market conditions to ensure that telecoil coupling will continue to be included in handsets.” The FCC should take “a hybrid approach to grandfathering in handsets as outlined by the Commission, with the ultimate goal of 100% of handset models meeting the ANSI C63.19-2019 standard and newer ANSI standards as they are developed,” they said. Signing the filing were the National Association of the Deaf, TDIforAccess, Communication Service for the Deaf and the Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Technology for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing at Gallaudet University. The HAC Task Force urged the FCC to align rules with its December 2022 recommendations (see 2212160063). The task force included both consumer and industry groups, and it adopted a unanimous report based on work that started in 2020. “The HAC Task Force recommendations embrace innovation and future trends while ensuring no consumer will be ‘left behind,’” the task force said: “All … participants support the goal of 100% HAC deployment, and they were proud to present the Commission with a concrete, achievable, consensus path to 100% HAC.” CTIA endorsed the 2022 report. “The recommendations are the fruits of a years-long, consensus-based process designed to answer the very question of whether and how 100% HAC can be achieved to benefit consumers with hearing loss,” CTIA said. Samsung Electronics America also endorsed the task force report. “Samsung’s own experience with Bluetooth demonstrates its importance as a hearing technology that is easily accessible to consumers throughout the United States,” the company said: “As a mainstream and growing technology, Bluetooth holds significant promise for consumers with hearing loss.” CTA said recent research supports the task force’s approach to HAC. “The interlocking recommendations in the Report encourage innovation by setting forth a flexible definition for HAC while ensuring testing to objective standards for compliance with deployment benchmarks,” CTA said. For the first time, the rules “incorporate Bluetooth into deployment benchmarks,” CTA said.

The FCC on Tuesday denied AT&T’s request that the agency not award 2.5 GHz licenses to T-Mobile, and said the licenses will be processed. AT&T challenged the awards in November 2022, noting T-Mobile’s already huge position in the band (see 2211100066). “We find that the grant of T-Mobile’s license application -- subject to its voluntary divestiture commitment in parts of Hawaii that we impose as a condition -- will promote the public interest by facilitating access to and use of the spectrum, particularly in rural areas where this band has been underutilized,” said the opinion and order by the Wireless Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics: “Accordingly, we deny AT&T’s petition to deny and will process T-Mobile’s application consistent with this Order and the Commission’s rules.” T-Mobile dominated the 2022 auction but required action from Congress before obtaining the licenses following expiration a year ago of the FCC’s auction authority (see 2312200061). T-Mobile recently committed to voluntarily divest, “either by sale or spectrum swap,” licenses it holds in two Hawaii markets, the FCC said.

The Wireless ISP Association praised the FCC's Friday order approving the launch of automated frequency coordination providers in the 6 GHz band (see 2402230050). “WISPA expects that this newly expanded marketplace will bring unimagined internet capacity quickly, flexibly and cost-effectively to places once thought ‘off the map,’” the group said: “This will enable connection of more Americans to life-bettering broadband.” WifiForward also praised the order. The databases launched “build upon a long line of innovations that the FCC has authorized to promote coexistence of different applications, which means better, faster connectivity for consumers, economic value and greater peace of mind for incumbent operators,” it said.

T-Mobile representatives explained in a meeting with FCC staffers its stance on exempting 5G network slicing from proposed net neutrality rules (see 2401310046). “T-Mobile emphasized that it is not asking the Commission to create a wholesale exemption from open internet rules for services powered by 5G network slicing,” said a filing posted Monday in docket 23-320. But some services that network slicing supports “are so specialized and distinct from general-purpose broadband” that they warrant updating the commission’s list of examples of non-broadband internet access services, T-Mobile said. T-Mobile cited as examples massive machine-type communications that support the IoT and ultra-reliable and low-latency communications supporting mission-critical services. “Updating the Commission’s examples of non-BIAS data services to reflect these technologies will give the industry greater certainty and help foster investment and innovation in these new service offerings,” the carrier said.

Spectrum for the Future, which represents companies and groups focused on unlicensed spectrum, Monday countered wireless carrier arguments that the lower 3 GHz band should be allocated for full-power, licensed use. “First and foremost, the U.S. wireless carriers’ current mid-band spectrum holdings exceed the amount of spectrum dedicated to wireless carriers in China and in many European countries,” the group said. The U.S. has already allocated hundreds of megahertz of mid-band spectrum at 3.65-4 GHz to U.S. carriers, “whereas China has not yet allocated that spectrum,” the group said: “The mobile network operators want you to believe there is a binary choice -- clear the spectrum for our companies or lose to China, or Europe or somebody else.”

Nokia said Monday its cloud radio access option, anyRAN, will be available commercially this year. “Last year, we launched anyRAN to give our customers more flexibility with Cloud RAN and we have since made huge strides in making Cloud RAN a commercial reality by completing numerous pilots and trials with the wider industry,” said Tommi Uitto, Nokia president-mobile networks. “We are now extending our reach to private wireless by offering more choices on core with our industry partners,” he said.

Supplemental coverage from space applications should show how those deployments would support 911 call and text routing to the geographically appropriate public safety answering point with sufficient location information, Intrado said. In a meeting with FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington's office recapped in a docket 22-271 filing Monday, company officials said some SCS 911 calls and texts will need to be routed to a nationwide 911 relay call center that can retrieve the location from the handset or ask the user verbally for the location and the nature of the emergency, they said.

The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation called on regulators to rethink their spectrum sharing approach, refocusing on a top tier providing licenses for full-power use of a band, with reliable access at all times. “The dichotomy between dynamic spectrum sharing and exclusive licensing is a false one,” ITIF said in a report released Monday: “Reliable, full-power access is possible within a dynamic sharing framework if the FCC auctions super-priority rights to commercial users.” ITIF cited the model provided by the citizens broadband radio service band, which offered three tiers, with priority access licenses (PALs) sold in an FCC auction, with lesser rights than the incumbent Navy systems the rules are designed to protect. “We should not confuse the particulars of that band with the principles of the dynamic sharing system,” the report said. “In a band with significantly fewer incumbency interests, rights amenable to proponents of exclusive, shared, and unlicensed spectrum can coexist within a dynamic sharing system with only a minor alteration: Instead of just protecting incumbents and auctioning PALs that are secondary to the incumbents’ rights, the FCC should also auction licenses for the same type of rights the Navy has in the CBRS band.” ITIF noted widespread industry criticism of how CBRS works. Part of the reason “for decrying CBRS is that it should hardly qualify as ‘sharing’ when the federal incumbent retains the right to do whatever it wants whenever and wherever it wants,” the report said. ITIF noted there have been no reports of Navy systems suffering harmful interference since CBRS was launched. “Any party that thinks the Navy has reliable, full-power access in the current CBRS band should leap at the opportunity to get the same deal in another band,” ITIF said.