CBRS

FCC Commissioners Mike O’Rielly and Jessica Rosenworcel, appearing together at a WifiForward event, agreed the FCC needs to make more spectrum available for Wi-Fi. Both expressed impatience with the slow pace of opening the 5.9 GHz band for sharing with Wi-Fi. O’Rielly said later he doesn’t have a firm timetable for the release of proposed rules for the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band.

Nokia CEO Rajeev Suri met with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai on spectrum issues, including the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband service band (see 1805220034 and 1805230013), said a filing in docket 14-177. Suri and Rick Corker, Nokia president North America, also met with Commissioners Mike O’Rielly and Jessica Rosenworcel. “Innovative spectrum policies [have] unlocked the potential of gigabits of spectrum, including the 3.5 GHz and mmWave bands,” the filing said. “The Commission should move more quickly to get those spectrum bands into the market via auction so that they can be put to use. The Nokia Executives asked that the Commission expedite auctioning mid-band and mmWave spectrum bands, and hold auctions that cover more than one band at a time, which will speed deployment of 5G services to American consumers.” The executives stressed the importance of the 3.7-4.2 GHz band “as the centerpiece for nationwide 5G deployment.” A proposal by Intelsat and SES "to unlock only 100 MHz of spectrum for 5G over 3 years is not sufficient to meet the needs of wireless operators, or to keep the U.S. competitive with the emerging 5G plans in China, Japan and Korea,” they said. They encouraged the FCC to approve this year proposals for spectrum access system administrators in the 3.5 GHz band (see 1805220065), including the telecom manufacturer's SAS submission. As the regulator tries to prevent USF from funding equipment that threatens national security, the firm asked it "not be used to cast uncertainty on the entire industry, including longstanding, well-vetted partners of U.S. government and industry."

The FCC Wireless Bureau and Office of Engineering and Technology, “on their own motion,” Tuesday provided a conditional waiver of rules for spectrum access system administrators in the nascent 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band. SASs could authorize only lower-power (Category A) devices to operate in the band outside of exclusion zones and couldn’t authorize the use of any higher-power (Category B) devices before certification and deployment of environmental sensing capability (ESC) operators. The FCC side-stepped this requirement, letting SASs use an alternative protection methodology based on dynamic protection areas (DPAs). Every SAS will have to decide whether it will take advantage of the rule change, the FCC said. “Prior to the deployment of an ESC, a DPA-enabled SAS may authorize both Category A and Category B [devices] and will not be required to enforce Exclusion Zones in areas protected by DPAs,” the order said. “Prior to the deployment of an ESC, non-DPA-enabled SASs may only authorize Category A CBSDs outside of Exclusion Zones, consistent with the current rules.” The FCC said the revised rules will permit operators in the band to “operate both Category A and Category B [devices] in a larger portion of the country more quickly than anticipated and thereby will promote efficient spectrum use and rapid commercial deployment in the band, encourage investment, and facilitate the expeditious provision of new products and services to the public while still protecting federal operations.”

CHARLOTTE -- Locked in a global race to 5G, the U.S. must be aggressive in lowering state and local barriers to wireless deployment, FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly told the Wireless Infrastructure Association Tuesday. The FCC should “exercise its authority” to stop “bad actors” in state and local government from slowing deployment of small cells, he said. O’Rielly said he wants to see a “solid mid-band play” for 5G wireless services available in the next two years. In an interview also Tuesday, O’Rielly also discussed net neutrality, 911 fee diversion and Sinclair.

CenturyLink was “regrettably” unable to sign the proposed framework for the citizens broadband radio service band submitted to the FCC last week by the CBRS Coalition, said a filing posted Thursday in docket 17-258. CenturyLink said the coalition proposal, which called for five county-based priority access licenses (PALs) and two census tract-based PALs (see 1805100062) in every market, didn’t provide enough small licenses. “A minimum of 40 MHz of licensed spectrum is essential to enable effective deployment of a fixed wireless high-speed broadband service in rural areas, especially one that would meet Connect America Fund Phase II broadband service requirements,” the telco said. It assured the commission it's serious about using the 3.5 GHz band. “This spectrum provides a rare opportunity to help meet the nation’s critical need for broadband network investment in difficult-to-serve rural areas that will otherwise remain left behind,” the company said. “The Commission can understand the reason that CenturyLink sees the coalition’s proposal as insufficient[.] CenturyLink is actively testing fixed wireless broadband service in the 3.5-3.7 GHz band and is evaluating the delivery of wireless broadband speeds of 10 Mbps downstream and 1 Mbps upstream.” NTIA, meanwhile, filed a letter at the FCC on technical aspects of the protection zones for DOD radar that are part of the rules for the band. NTIA also notified the FCC of a new exclusion zone for Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada.

An auction of priority access licenses (PAL) in the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band may not happen until late next year, Mark Gibson, senior director-business development at CommScope, told the National Spectrum Managers Association Wednesday at its annual meeting. Fletcher Heald attorney Mitchell Lazarus warned the FCC is making more decisions based on politics rather than engineering.

The main wireless carrier associations and other groups said they met with FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly on the latest discussions on the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band. O’Rielly, overseeing a rewrite of the CBRS rules, urged stakeholders to negotiate (see 1802130041). “The parties continued to discuss their respective positions regarding the geographic licensing areas for Priority Access Licenses in the 3.5 GHz band,” said a filing in docket 17-258. “The parties also continued to reiterate the importance of the 3.5 GHz band to serving a variety of business cases and deployment plans.” Officials from the Competitive Carriers Association, CTIA, General Electric, NCTA, NTCA, the Rural Wireless Association and Wireless ISP Association attended. The principals met O’Rielly in April (see 1805010052).

The U.S. is moving toward creation of a national spectrum strategy that would predict spectrum trends and allow companies to do a better job of planning, said DOD spectrum chief Fred Moorefield at the National Spectrum Management Association annual conference Tuesday. “I think you'll see that coming out of the White House soon." He noted the Pentagon will update its own spectrum road map and action plan.

The American Petroleum Institute can't support a proposal last week by the Wireless ISP Association and others on the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band because it would allow only two census-tract-sized priority access licenses (PALs) in each market (see 1805100062). The better proposal would provide four census-tract licenses in each market and four wide-area licenses, API said. “This would not only achieve a fair compromise with the large wireless carriers, but would allow at least 40 megahertz of CBRS spectrum for oil and gas industry entities and other industrial and critical-infrastructure operators to self-provision their own geographically-targeted private wireless … networks at their facilities throughout the United States,” API said Monday in docket 17-258. Meanwhile, Key Bridge Wireless and Fairspectrum, two prospective spectrum access system (SAS) administrators in the band, said census-tract PALs shouldn't be a concern. “Large mobile carriers now complain that licensing PALs according to census tracts is unworkable,” the two said. “While others have forcefully corrected these claims, we write to emphasize that no SAS administrator has claimed that incorporating census tracts into the SAS is too difficult and no SAS administrator has asked the Commission to change the size of PAL areas.”

Census tracts are likely to be a battleground in licensing the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band, with the CBRS Coalition proposal explicitly including census tract licenses (see 1805100062), experts and insiders told us Friday. A rival plan from CTIA and the Competitive Carriers Association involves county-based and metropolitan statistical area licenses (see 1804230064). CTIA and CCA didn't comment Friday. The CBRS Coalition proposal contains a mix of licensing areas for everyone, emailed Public Knowledge Senior Vice President Harold Feld. "That is what a compromise is," he said. "It means everyone gets something." Parties who don't think census tracts are usable "don't have to bid on them," he said. That the CBRS Coalition is made up of interests ranging from small mobile carriers to electric co-ops points to the difficulty of getting them all on the same page, so the coalition's proposal was its bottom line, not a starting point for talks, said a Coalition member executive. The FCC might be able to come up with a third position, but that seems unlikely, the executive said, saying it's also unlikely CTIA and CCA can or will modify their position.