3.45 GHz Lobbying Intensifies Before End of Such Meetings

Lobbying intensified before an expected Wednesday sunshine notice on what model FCC members should approve March 17 for auctioning frequencies at 3.45 GHz, filings showed. Cable and satellite stakeholders were among those seeking changes to the auction draft rules so that bidding resembles that used in bidding for citizens broadband radio service airwaves. Others seek for the regulator to stick with the C-band auction approach, which is what the original draft that recently circulated would do.

NCTA and member companies warned that without changes, rules for the 3.45 GHz auction would be detrimental to using CBRS. Update rules to allow “successful time division duplex (TDD) synchronization among 3.45 GHz licensees and with adjacent” CBRS licensees “to prevent harmful interference,” NCTA said in a filing posted Tuesday in docket 19-348: “As CableLabs’ technical work demonstrates, the introduction of an unsynchronized 3.45 GHz network adjacent to 3.5 GHz operations results in significant coverage loss for CBRS operators, with only 4 percent to 15 percent of CBRS user devices retaining coverage.” NCTA was joined by Charter Communications, Comcast, Cox Enterprises and others in conversations with aides to the four commissioners and Wireless Bureau, Office of Economics and Analytics and Office of Engineering and Technology staff.

Dish Network Chairman Charlie Ergen and other executives raised concerns in calls with Commissioner Nathan Simington and an aide to Commissioner Geoffrey Starks. "Think holistically about all currently licensed mid-band spectrum in order to maximize the efficient use of these important frequencies,” it said: “Aligning certain key services rules in the CBRS band and further evaluating spectrum aggregation limits for Auction 110… will help further this goal, facilitating robust competition and American leadership in 5G.”

Adopt "commercial power limits similar to C-Band and reject CBRS-like power limits and sharing,” UScellular CEO Laurent Therivel urged acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel: “Adopt 10 X 10 MHz licenses as opposed to 5 X 20 MHz.”

Aerospace and defense (A&D) industry groups and companies sought protections for their use of the broader 3.1-3.55 Ghz band. Lockheed Martin told a Rosenworcel aide that its test facilities use the band “on a nearly constant basis.” The A&D industry “has long had access to the 3100-3100 MHz band on an experimental basis to conduct testing, research, and development for manufacturing and production of radars and other systems used by their customers, who operate on a primary basis,” said companies led by the Aerospace Industries Association. The group, Boeing, L3Harris Technologies, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and others, spoke with aides to Starks, Simington and Commissioner Brendan Carr (see here, here and here).

Auction the 3.45 GHz band “under a framework based on the model successfully employed for the recent auction of mid-band spectrum” for CBRS, Southern Linc asked Rosenworcel, Starks and Simington aides: “In addition to nationwide, regional and rural service providers, the licensing framework for the CBRS band drew participation from electric utilities and other private network operators.”