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.

Verizon is “likely” to participate in next year’s TV incentive auction, CEO Lowell McAdam said Thursday at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia Conference in New York. That message was marginally more positive than comments Chief Financial Officer Fran Shammo made in July during an earnings call, in which he said only that Verizon had yet to make any decisions (see 1507210042). But McAdam also warned Thursday that the 600 MHz spectrum is less valuable to Verizon than the mid-band spectrum it bought in the recently concluded AWS-3 auction. He also downplayed any likelihood Verizon will make a play for Dish Network.

Wireless Bureau officials wouldn't say what’s next as the FCC starts an examination of bidirectional sharing, following comments by Chairman Tom Wheeler in an Aug. 3 blog post. The FCBA Wireless Committee held a brown bag lunch Wednesday with Chief Roger Sherman and other officials from the bureau. It's “been extremely busy over the past year” on auction and non-auction issues, Sherman said. “I’ve been here two years and it feels like five.”

A CTIA proposal to change the conditions under which broadcasters must vacate their sold 600 MHz spectrum after the incentive auction to make way for the new wireless owners (see 1509100072) isn't as limited as the wireless organization is making it out to be, said an NAB spokesman. The FCC proposal is to require low-power TV stations to leave their former spectrum once the wireless licensee “commences operations” -- setting up permanent facilities and antennas. That plan won't allow for market testing that is “integral to the deployment of broadband,” said CTIA Vice President-Regulatory Affairs Scott Bergmann in an interview. Instead, CTIA wants the commission to define the commencement of operations as beginning when wireless carriers begin doing limited market tests in “certain select markets.”

LAS VEGAS -- Impairment remains a major concern for carriers, only 200 days before the scheduled start of the TV incentive auction, said Joan Marsh, AT&T vice president-regulatory. Uncertainty over impairments to some 600 MHz license creates uncertainty and poses “enormous deployment challenges,” Marsh said at CTIA. A key FCC official said he understood carriers have concerns.

The FCC should accept a compromise proposal on when the new wireless owners of 600 MHz spectrum are considered to have commenced operations on their new spectrum, said CTIA and representatives of AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon and U.S. Cellular in a meeting Sept. 2 with staff from the Wireless Bureau, Incentive Auction Task Force, Media Bureau, Office of General Counsel and the Office of Engineering and Technology, according to an ex parte filing posted Thursday in docket 12-268. The FCC proposal to limit the "commence operations" definition to areas where a 600 MHz licensee has begun site activation, and commissioning tests using permanent equipment and antennas, “would unnecessarily preclude rapid deployment of the spectrum,” the wireless interests said. Under the CTIA compromise, low-power TV and unlicensed users would still be able to use the 600 MHZ spectrum until the wireless users started substantially using it, but the wireless licensees would have the right to do “market testing” of their new spectrum. The tests would take place “in only a fraction of the areas where full commercial launch would occur,” CTIA said. “LPTV stations and other secondary users could continue to utilize the mobile wireless band in the vast majority of areas beyond this stage.” By beginning market testing, the wireless company would have officially commenced operations, under the compromise proposal, CTIA said. Where market testing isn’t required, the definition of commencing operations would be as the FCC has proposed. “Inhibiting market testing in any fashion, and particularly in the limited window available after full power broadcast television stations are relocated, will greatly jeopardize wireless providers’ ability to meet the six-year interim build-out requirement,” CTIA said. “Under the compromise proposal, secondary services will not be impacted in the vast majority of markets and geography.”