The CBRS Alliance and Small Cell Forum agreed to “cooperate closely” on the citizens broadband radio service band rollout, on a "variety of initiatives related to the wide-scale adoption of small cells, network densification, and the development, commercialization and adoption of OnGo-certified solutions,” they said Wednesday. Collaboration areas “include investigating multi-operator solutions in the 3.5 GHz band, defining indoor solution architectures for densification, and exploring the international opportunity for Spectrum Access System-coordinated shared spectrum.”
Carriers need access to a “sufficient supply of harmonized low band, mid band and high band spectrum to deliver on 5G promises,” 5G Americas reported Friday. The group stressed the need for more licensed spectrum in the 7-24 GHz range. It put special emphasis on the C band: “All or a significant portion of the 3.70-4.20 GHz band for licensed flexible deployment should be made available as soon as possible.”
Pricing concessions T-Mobile offered the FCC Monday (see 1902040064) could show the carrier's proposed buy of Sprint faces difficulty winning clearance from the FCC and DOJ, New Street’s Blair Levin wrote investors Tuesday. “Generally when it comes to mergers, the first side to offer concessions is likely to be the side that is losing,” Levin wrote. “Implicitly conceding that market forces alone are not sufficient to constrain prices is not a sign that the economic arguments at the DOJ about the impact of the deal on competition are working.” The commitment goes against antitrust chief Makan Delrahim's views that regulators shouldn't impose behavioral remedies “like pricing commitments.” Such a remedy “supplants competition with regulation [and] replaces disaggregated decision making with central planning” and “most behavioral decrees cure neither the incentive nor the ability of the merged company to exert enhanced leverage gained through an anticompetitive merger,” Delrahim believes, Levin said. “Offering such a concession suggests the company is seeking to garner support in the political realm." Timing is also off, since such commitments usually come at a process' end and DOJ appears to still be gathering evidence, he said. Levin said T-Mobile’s hiring of former Commissioner Mignon Clyburn likely won’t have a major effect on how regulators treat the deal. She's recused from lobbying at the FCC, he said, and is "not close to the DOJ antitrust division staff or the states attorneys generals, where we think the risks to the deal are greatest."
Mint Mobile, which describes itself as “one of the nation's fastest growing wireless companies,” bought a 30-second spot during the Super Bowl Sunday. The ad featured former NFL star Deion Sanders and offered wireless internet for $20 a month, with two months free.
NAB warned that spectrum sharing often isn’t easy, commenting (see 1901230028) to NTIA on the national spectrum plan, as other groups filed last week despite the federal shutdown. “Widespread successful spectrum sharing involving sensitive information is likely to require a third party, trusted by all involved spectrum users, to act as a frequency coordinator,” NAB said. “All spectrum users involved in a sharing arrangement will need to have real-time communication with the trusted third party to provide up-to-the minute information on operating conditions and to facilitate interference reporting.” This third party must also have “enforcement capability to alter the sharing parties’ operating conditions to mitigate or avoid interference, and to shut down interference sources if necessary,” NAB said. The Telecommunications Industry Association said spectrum policies must be predictable, flexible and efficient, protecting those with superior rights. “Good spectrum policy decisions need to be made on a band-by-band basis, depending on the particular propagation characteristics of a band, existing service allocations, and existing incumbent services within a band,” TIA said. “While spectrum sharing approaches and technologies are increasingly becoming available, the existence of either should not, by itself, justify regulatory action to implement a sharing system.” APCO noted that "public safety communications systems are designed for the worst-case, highest-use scenario and therefore may require a much greater surge capacity.” Declare "spectrum is the quickest and most cost-effective way to provide access to broadband services to rural areas that lack access or choice,” the Wireless ISP Association asked. NTIA “should consider the growing socioeconomic benefits of unlicensed spectrum use cases," like Wi-Fi, the Wi-Fi Alliance said. “This includes promoting shared spectrum access among Federal and unlicensed spectrum users.” Satellite operators need long-term access to spectrum, the Satellite Industry Association said. “Due to the long lead time to design, construct, and deploy satellite networks, satellite operators must obtain funding and spectrum rights years in advance of launch.”
The Citizens Broadband Radio Service Alliance is adding members like the Wireless ISP Association, working with ATIS, and released a certification tool developed with Radisys, the CBRS alliance said Monday. “Now with more than 120 members, the Alliance is seeing a new set of organizations beginning to engage in the OnGo ecosystem,” it said. Cisco Wireless Chief Technology Officer Matthew MacPherson joined the alliance’s board, the group said.
Norway could unseat South Korea as the nation most prone to deliberate GPS signal jamming by a neighboring country, the Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation blogged Friday. It said since 2017, five major GPS/Global Navigation Satellite System jamming incidents have been reported in northern Norway, and Russia has been the cause whenever the source was tracked down.
NTIA's inclusion of protecting space assets from RF interference in goals as the U.S. seeks to create a long-term national spectrum strategy (see 1812210035) reflects economic importance of GPS, GPS Innovation Alliance Executive Director David Grossman blogged Monday. NTIA said protecting GPS signals from the increased spectrum use that will come with 5G deployment requires either keeping high-powered signals away from GPS or following the 1 dB noise floor standard for interference measurement.
The FCC Office of Engineering and Technology approved a waiver for Google's Project Soli 3D sensor technology to enable touchless control of device functions. The company sought leeway to operate at higher power levels consistent with what's allowed in Europe, and OET sought comment last spring (see 1803120031). “Soli sensors, when operating under the waiver conditions … pose minimal potential of causing harmful interference to other spectrum users and uses of the 57-64 GHz frequency band, including for the earth exploration satellite service (EESS) and the radio astronomy service (RAS),” said Monday's order. “Grant of the waiver will serve the public interest by providing for innovative device control features using touchless hand gesture technology.”
Microsoft raised concerns about Sennheiser's petition for an NPRM on innovation and development of new wireless mic technologies such as wireless multichannel audio systems (WMAS) technology (see 1812280053). Don't allow use of WMAS technology on an unlicensed basis without complying with other Part 15 rules, Microsoft asked in RM-11821. “Licensed Part 74 wireless microphone operations, including WMAS, should continue to be prohibited in the 6 megahertz unlicensed channel within the 600 MHz band duplex gap,” Microsoft sought. “Continue to prohibit unlicensed WMAS operations throughout the broadcast television bands and the duplex gap, if such operations are inconsistent with other existing Part 15 technical rules.”