U.S. negotiators worked out an agreement in principle with Mexico over channel assignments after the TV incentive auction, industry officials told us Wednesday. Canada earlier released a "Consultation on Repurposing the 600 MHz Band” and is on its way to addressing a post-auction world, the officials said.

NAB offered a concession on the controversial FCC proposal to put some TV stations in the “duplex gap” between uplink and downlink frequencies bought by carriers in the TV incentive auction (see 1507130054). “It is important to pursue every avenue of possible consensus,” NAB told the FCC Tuesday. The future of the gap is a hot topic as the agency wraps up incentive auction rules for the auction slated to start March 29.

The Competitive Carriers Association and members support an FCC move to place TV stations in the duplex gap as part of TV incentive auction rules, but are also open to other alternatives, CCA said in a Friday filing at the FCC, reporting on a meeting with an aide to Commissioner Mignon Clyburn. “As the Commission’s models have shown, without the ability to place broadcast stations in the duplex gap, the Commission simply cannot reclaim as much spectrum for licensed broadband deployment,” CCA said. “CCA and its members are, however, open to any solution that will maximize spectrum clearing while providing ample spectrum for unlicensed devices, and proposed various alternatives to meet these goals.” One possibility, CCA suggested, would be identifying an additional channel for unlicensed use in the post-auction broadcast segment in markets where the duplex gap is unavailable. “This ‘replacement channel’ would provide developers and manufacturers the certainty they need to invest in the band by making up for the capacity lost as a result of permitting broadcast operations in the duplex gap,” CCA said. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler pulled an order addressing the duplex gap and other incentive auction issues from the agenda for last week's meeting, but promised action at the Aug. 6 meeting (see 1507150058).

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said Thursday that he circulated an order addressing long-form applications of Northstar Wireless and SNR Wireless, the designated entities employed by Dish Network to indirectly capture the second-most AWS-3 spectrum of any player in the auction at discounted prices (see 1501300051). Wheeler dropped the news during a media briefing after the commission meeting and declined to say what he had recommended. Industry officials say they have been told the order is an Enforcement Bureau action, which they said could well be bad news for Dish and the two DEs.

The FCC should retain flexibility to place TV stations in the 600 MHz duplex gap when necessary to secure sufficient spectrum for broadband use as part of the TV incentive auction, the Competitive Carriers Association said Wednesday. “The FCC should not sacrifice larger nationwide broadband spectrum-clearing targets for modest gains in unlicensed spectrum availability when reasonable alternatives exist,” CCA President Steve Berry said in a news release. Berry said CCA supports proposals by consultant Henry Waxman, D-Calif., former chairman and later ranking member of the House Commerce Committee, filed at the FCC last week. Waxman, a consultant to CCA member T-Mobile, proposed that the FCC put broadcasters in the gap only if broadcasters do not offer 84 MHz of spectrum or more for sale in the auction (see 1507100048). Berry said CCA supports Waxman’s proposal for a revised trigger on the spectrum reserve and strongly supports holding the auction in early 2016.

The FCC should ignore further arguments in favor of an expanded amount of reserve spectrum for the TV incentive auction and let the auction proceed, Doug Brake, telecom policy analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, said in a Monday blog post. “We already had this debate with the initial mobile spectrum holdings report and order a year ago,” Brake wrote. “There was an extensive back and forth on this very issue, the FCC already decided on a compromise. The FCC recognized the importance of 600 MHz spectrum to the competitive landscape, but also recognized that the primary advantage of auctioning spectrum is to discover the firm who values a particular license most.” The issue is before the FCC as it takes up refinements to the auction rules at its Thursday meeting (see 1507060068). Despite the claims of their competitors, Verizon and AT&T are the most spectrum-restrained carriers, Brake wrote. “These companies are not hoarding spectrum to foreclose competitors, but aggressively deploying,” he said. “Furthermore, this is an industry in the midst of a price war with margins falling. In fact, T-Mobile appears to be doing quite well by focusing on capacity in urban areas. Issues around rural coverage in this debate are largely red herrings -- the need for more spectrum, and, frankly, the money, is still in cities.”

The Competitive Carriers Association and leading members T-Mobile and Sprint jointly met with FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn to make their case for a larger spectrum reserve than the 30 MHz proposed by the commission. Dish Network was also at the meeting. The competitive carriers also stressed the importance of getting the reserve trigger right in the auction rules, said a filing posted Monday in docket 12-269. “The spectrum reserve is the only remaining competitive safeguard still under consideration to prevent AT&T and Verizon from using the 600 MHz auction to further consolidate their already considerable low-band spectrum holdings,” the competitors said.

The FCC should be “wary” of proposals to allow wireless microphone use in spectrum bands “that may present future opportunities for flexible, mobile broadband use,” CTIA said in a letter Monday to the FCC in docket 12-268. CTIA cited specifically the FCC’s look at such bands as the 1435-1525 MHz band for commercial wireless services. “To the extent the Commission does consider such bands, the Commission should resist calls to substantially increase the allocation to wireless microphone use,” CTIA said. “For example, granting wireless microphone access to the entire 1.4 GHz band would result in significant increase in the amount of spectrum beyond the capacity that may be lost in the 600 MHz band. In effect, such a proposal would replace capabilities present in the current regulations -- twelve megahertz of spectrum capacity -- with access to 90 megahertz.”

CLEVELAND -- ATSC President Mark Richer thinks commercial launches of ATSC 3.0 TVs and broadcast services (see 1504130028) are possible by the end of the decade, perhaps sooner, he said Thursday at field trials to showcase the LG-Zenith-GatesAir Futurecast technology proposal for ATSC 3.0. Richer was among a group of several dozen broadcast industry dignitaries, including Lynn Claudy, NAB senior vice president-technology, and ATSC Chairman Glenn Reitmeier of NBCUniversal invited to Cleveland to witness the Futurecast field trials in action.

NAB took issue with CTIA’s request for rule tweaks that would provide additional protection for LTE from wireless mics and unlicensed devices (see 1507090032), in an FCC filing. CTIA offered eight suggestions for nuts-and-bolts changes to the auction rules in its Thursday letter to the commission, posted Friday in docket 14-252.