Wireless Telecommunications

The US government has initiated an extraordinary outreach campaign to foreign allies, trying to persuade wireless and internet providers in these countries to avoid telecommunications equipment from China’s Huawei Technologies Co., apparently. American officials have briefed their government counterparts and telecom executives in friendly countries where Huawei equipment is already in wide use, including Germany, Italy and Japan, about what they see as cybersecurity risks.

T-Mobile is offering a revised rationale for buying Sprint, a turn that critics say is a sign the carrier’s earlier arguments weren’t winning over US officials who can bless or kill the deal. T-Mobile told the Federal Communications Commission in a filing earlier in Nov that it needs the Sprint merger to help it compete more vigorously against giants AT&T and Verizon. In Sept, the company focused on how the tie-up would give it an edge in quickly building an advanced wireless network known as 5G, a goal of the Trump administration.

Verizon and the City of Boston (MA) signed updated agreements to accelerate Boston’s plan to be one of the most technologically advanced cities in the nation. Building on the relationship formed in 2016, Verizon will expand its local wireless network, bring Fios Internet and TV to the city’s remaining neighborhoods not covered in the original franchise agreement, and collaborate with Boston on Smart Communities solutions.

I want to give your readers an update on the latest move by AT&T to push people off the traditional home phone service they have relied upon for decades. This past Sept, we began to field calls from worried landline customers, including seniors on fixed incomes, who were among an estimated 5,300 customers to receive a letter from AT&T with the blunt headline: “Your Lifeline discount ends November 20, 2018.” The letter referred to the federal Lifeline program, which offers a monthly credit of up to $11.75 for qualifying low-income customers.

I thought I’d focus on what the Federal Communications Commission is doing to promote US leadership in some of the most promising sectors of our economy. In particular, I’d like to talk about next-generation wireless technology and the space industry, which you may be surprised to learn has key tie-ins with the FCC.

The Federal Communications Commission's 600 MHz incentive auction of TV broadcasters’ unwanted spectrum was a noteworthy event. It was the culmination of years of work by officials at the FCC—it initially arose from the National Broadband Plan in 2010—and it featured “beachfront” low-band spectrum ideal for long-distance connections. Further, the auction itself sported a unique “reverse” auction that paid TV broadcasters for their unwanted spectrum licenses, and then made that spectrum available to wireless carriers and others through a traditional “forward” auction.

Sens Ed Markey (D-MA), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), and Ron Wyden (D-OR) sent letters to AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile after a recent study revealed the companies were slowing down certain services on their networks. “All online traffic should be treated equally, and internet service providers should not discriminate against particular content or applications for competitive advantage purposes or otherwise,” write the Sens in their letters. The Senators ask for responses to questions that include:

The Federal Communications Commission today adopted a Report and Order that:

Cellphone carriers often call their most valuable radio-wave licenses “beachfront” property. As with real estate, it pays to be in a prime location. Government officials will test that thinking this month by selling some once-barren tracts of that virtual real estate in the upper reaches of the wireless spectrum. How much companies are willing to pay for them remains to be seen. The Federal Communications Commission began the first of two auctions for extremely high-frequency spectrum licenses, raising cash from a type of radio wave once considered useless for wireless service.

Instead of embracing 5G, San Jose (CA) Mayor Sam Liccardo taxed it.  Beginning in 2015, the city sought up to $3,500 per year per small cell.  Compare that to $100 in Phoenix (AZ) and $50 in Indianapolis (IN) — cities about the size of San Jose that have leapfrogged it in terms of small cell deployment. Excessive taxes charged by big cities deplete the capital needed to build broadband in suburban and rural America. That’s why several dozen mayors, county supervisors, and elected leaders called on the Federal Communications Commission to act.