An Intelsat/Intel plan for freeing up some C-band downlink spectrum in metropolitan areas nationwide (see 1710020047) is getting mixed responses. Meanwhile, wireless interests continue to push for opening up the 6 GHz band for unlicensed operations, raising red flags with public safety. Wednesday was the deadline for replies in the mid-band notice of inquiry docket 17-183 that already had disagreements among industries and saw many comments posted through Friday (see 1710030052).
Wireless Spectrum Auctions
The FCC manages and licenses the electromagnetic spectrum used by wireless, broadcast, satellite and other telecommunications services for government and commercial users. This activity includes organizing specific telecommunications modes to only use specific frequencies and maintaining the licensing systems for each frequency such that communications services and devices using different bands receive as little interference as possible.
What are spectrum auctions?
The FCC will periodically hold auctions of unused or newly available spectrum frequencies, in which potential licensees can bid to acquire the rights to use a specific frequency for a specific purpose. As an example, over the last few years the U.S. government has conducted periodic auctions of different GHz bands to support the growth of 5G services.
Latest spectrum auction news
The FCC, having made 1,700 MHz additional high-band spectrum available for mobile use Thursday, plans to initiate a third spectrum frontiers proceeding in the first half of 2018 that will look at the 23, 42 and 50 GHz bands and tee up the 26 GHz band, Commissioner Mike O'Rielly said as commissioners approved 4-1 the latest spectrum frontiers NPRM and Further NPRM. Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel said the agency needs to speed up the path for 5G implementation and laid out a five-point plan: “We are simply not moving fast enough."
House Communications Subcommittee members universally lauded potential benefits of deploying 5G technology during a Thursday hearing, with members of both parties emphasizing the need for the U.S. to take a leading role in advancing the technology. But the hearing also featured debate on proposals on Capitol Hill, the FCC and elsewhere to pre-empt state, local and tribal antenna siting rules, as expected (see 1711150052). Senate Commerce Committee staffers are evaluating a draft bill from Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., and Communications Subcommittee ranking member Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, that would ease siting requirements (see 1710310057).
The FCC deserves credit for making more high-frequency spectrum available for 5G, expected at the Thursday commissioners’ meeting, but now the agency has to schedule an auction, blogged Stacey Black, AT&T assistant vice president-federal policy. “Now that the Commission has the 5G ball rolling with spectrum allocations, we urgently need to get to the next step -- auctioning this newly allocated spectrum so that mobile broadband providers can deploy as quickly as possible,” Black wrote Wednesday. “As an industry, we believe the best timing for auctioning the 28 GHz and 37-40 GHz bands is by December 2018. By this time, chipsets and equipment will be commercially available, FCC service rules will have been finalized, and standards will have evolved to a point that permits commercial 5G network deployments in 2019.” At the meeting, regulators will take up an order reallocating the 24 and 47 GHz bands for 5G (see 1710270030). Wireless industry officials expect an auction by the end of next year of bands reallocated in 2016 (see 1711030045). Citing the blog, Commissioner Mike O'Rielly tweeted Wednesday that he concurs on "need & timeliness of 5G spectrum auctions," but the agency "has a statutory hiccup" and he's supporting "targeted bills" by Reps. Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., and Doris Matsui, D-Calif. and by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune, R-S.D. According to O'Rielly's office, those were references to Guthrie and Matsui's Spectrum Auctions Deposits Act and to similar legislation Thune introduced last Congress and is working on again, though it hasn't been reintroduced.
The House Communications Subcommittee's Thursday hearing on 5G is aimed mainly at educating members on potential benefits of and barriers to 5G deployments, but it also could feature debate about related proposals to pre-empt state, local and tribal siting rules and exempt projects from some existing review requirements, lawmakers, House aides and lobbyists told us. Senate Commerce is evaluating the Streamlining Permitting to Enable Efficient Deployment of Broadband Infrastructure Act (S-1988) and a draft bill from committee Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., and House Communications Subcommittee ranking member Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, both geared toward easing siting requirements (see 1710200047 and 1710310057). The hearing begins at 10 a.m. in 2123 Rayburn.
U.S. Cellular Chairman LeRoy Carlson met with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai on the national carrier’s need for high-frequency spectrum for 5G. U.S. Cellular “discussed how its experiments with fixed 4G wireless service have produced strong results,” said a filing posted Tuesday in docket 14-177. “Its future ability to continue to compete with the dominant nationwide carriers will depend in large part on its deployment of 5G networks, which will require access to millimeter wave band spectrum.” Competitive carriers need access to high-band spectrum below 30 GHz, because of the propagation characteristics, the filing said. Its target band is 24 GHz, cleared by the FCC for 5G. The company urged the FCC “to ensure that smaller bidders have a reasonable opportunity to acquire licenses for the 24 GHz band.” The agency should license the band using seven 100-MHz blocks, it said. “Because licenses for 200 megahertz blocks could be prohibitively expensive for many smaller bidders, all such bidders could be forced to compete for a single 24 GHz band license in each market, which undoubtedly would cause this license to sell at a premium," the carrier said. "Licensing the 24 GHz band primarily on the basis of 200 megahertz blocks also would mean artificially restricting this band to, at most, four licensees, likely to the exclusion of smaller bidders.” The carrier had meetings with the other commissioners as well.
The FCC will move on additional infrastructure overhaul, but not all at once, Rachael Bender, wireless adviser to Chairman Ajit Pai, told an FCBA lunch audience Wednesday. Aides to all five commissioners were at the session and indicated they mostly agreed on the importance of 5G and other looming spectrum issues. The Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee meets Thursday in what's expected to be a key session.
T-Mobile and Sprint pulling the plug on a potential combination (see 1711060068) is likely good for FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, since work on approval would have taken over a big part of the wireless agenda for months to come, former and other industry officials said Tuesday. It means the FCC won’t have decide immediately whether four major national wireless carriers are necessary for wireless competition. AT&T’s proposed buy of T-Mobile in 2011 dominated wireless discussions for months before the would-be buyer pulled out.
Starry Internet CEO Chet Kanojia told staff the FCC should reject any move to scuttle commercial-to-commercial sharing in the lower 37 GHz band as part of the broader spectrum frontiers proceeding, meeting with Wireless Bureau Chief Donald Stockdale, Office of Engineering and Technology Chief Julius Knapp and others. The lower 37 GHz band “represents only 4 percent of the aggregate amount of spectrum made available through the First Spectrum Frontiers” order, the company said in docket 14-177. “This de minimis amount of spectrum does not significantly alter any company’s decision in their investment in millimeter wave bands or significantly impact any auction.”
The FCC is likely to schedule an auction of the millimeter wave bands approved by the FCC last year for 5G in late 2018, carrier executives said. An auction of the bands teed up for the FCC’s Nov. 16 meeting is expected to come later. If the FCC holds this auction as expected next year, that should be early enough to get the spectrum in play as industry rolls out mobile 5G, the carrier executives said.