Federal Communications Commission Acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel shared with her colleagues a draft Order that would make much-needed mid-band spectrum available for 5G. If adopted at the FCC’s March 17 Open Meeting, 100 megahertz of mid-band spectrum in the 3.45-3.55 GHz band would be made available for auction and 5G deployment across the contiguous United States. The Acting Chairwoman also shared with her colleagues a proposed Public Notice seeking comment on procedures for this auction (Auction 110), in which bidding would begin in early October 2021. The proposed new rules, if adopted, would allocate the 3.45-3.55 GHz spectrum band for flexible-use service. It would establish a framework for coordination of non-federal and federal use and establish a band plan, as well as technical, licensing, and competitive bidding rules for the band. Lastly, it would complete the relocation of non-federal radiolocation operators to the 2.9-3.0 GHz band and the sunset of amateur use in the 3.3-3.5 GHz band.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act included a provision, the Beat CHINA for 5G Act of 2020, which requires the FCC to commence a system of competitive bidding for licenses in the 3.45 GHz band by the end of 2021. Rosenworcel’s proposal positions the agency to meet this obligation. In addition, this proposal would be an important step in fulfilling Congress’s directive in the MOBILE NOW Act for the FCC to work with National Telecommunications and Information Administration to evaluate the feasibility of allowing commercial use in the 3.1-3.55 GHz band.

California may soon begin enforcing its first-in-the-nation net neutrality law after a federal judge ruled against broadband providers that had sought to scuttle the state’s open-Internet safeguards. The ruling amounts to a major victory for advocates of rules that require broadband service providers to treat all Web traffic equally, potentially setting the stage for states nationwide to follow California’s lead and adopt tough new protections of their own. Judge John Mendez of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California "found that the law is on a solid legal foundation and that the ISPs trying to overturn it are not likely to prevail,” said Barbara van Schewick, a law professor at Stanford University. She penned one of the legal briefs in support of the law and against the Internet providers that had sought an injunction to stop it from taking effect. “This is a huge victory for net neutrality and bodes well for other states that have adopted net neutrality requirements,” said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, senior counselor to the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, which had filed an amicus brief in support of California’s rules.

The four trade groups that had filed the lawsuit — America’s Communications Association, CTIA, the NCTA and USTelecom — said they “will review the court’s opinion before deciding on next steps,” signaling a potential appeal that could again forestall enforcement of California’s rules. “A state-by-state approach to Internet regulation will confuse consumers and deter innovation, just as the importance of broadband for all has never been more apparent,” they said in a joint statement. “We agree with the Court that a piecemeal approach is untenable and that Congress should codify rules for an open Internet.”

The Federal Communications Commission is creating the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program with $3.2 billion allocated by Congress. Not surprisingly, broadband service providers are focused on making sure they can access as much of that money as possible. That means leveling the playing field with current participants in the FCC’s Lifeline program. Ninety percent of Lifeline participants are wireless carriers, NCTA–The Internet & Television Association VP and general counsel Steve Morris told the FCC at a roundtable on the new subsidy. In virtual meetings with FCC staffers, ACA Connects, the NCTA, internet and competitive networks trade group INCOMPAS and WISPA (the wireless internet-service providers association) presented a united front in calling for flexible rules regarding “the specific service offerings that are available for the EBB program, the categories of households that may participate, and the verification processes that providers will use to qualify households.” For its part, NCTA said the money should be available to as wide a pool of consumers as possible. It urged the FCC to make sure all providers, including broadband cable operators that have not been Lifeline participants, have an equal shot at the money, rather than giving current Lifeline participants a head start, and by minimizing administrative and implementation “burdens.”

The Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA) doesn’t appreciate all the scorn being heaped on fixed wireless access (FWA) technology, which is coming from some groups that didn’t win as many Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) awards as they had hoped. In a letter to the Federal Communications Commission, WISPA specifically takes exception to a filing made by NTCA-The Rural Broadband Association, which implies that FWA networks cannot deliver gigabit speeds. WISPA says that while the possible speed of a wireless link depends on many factors, especially the quality of the path, the recent availability of millimeter-wave systems and equipment, especially on the unlicensed 60 GHz band, and the pending availability of standard-power devices on the 6 GHz band, make gigabit download wireless speeds a realistic option in many places.

We evaluate the impact of mobile operator mergers on the unit price of data and voice by using country-level observations on retail revenue for data, cellular data traffic, retail revenue for voice, and outgoing voice minutes. Using a difference-in-differences estimation strategy, we estimate the effect of operator merger by comparing the difference between the non-merging countries and the merging countries before and after the introduction of the operator merger. In accordance with the theoretical prediction provided in this paper, we empirically find that mergers tend to decrease the data unit price and increase the voice unit price.