The House Consumer Protection Subcommittee plans a 10 a.m. hearing on autonomous vehicle technology Tuesday in 2123 Rayburn.

Commissioner Mike O’Rielly assured the Washington Auto Show Thursday the FCC doesn’t plan to pick winners and losers in the 5.9 GHz band and will let the market decide. O’Rielly predicted the agency could make a decision on its NPRM this summer. The proposal would allow for both cellular vehicle-to-everything and dedicated short-range communications technologies, he said. “We’re going to see what takes off.” Some in the auto industry understand what the FCC is trying to do here, O’Rielly told us: “Others have an agenda and a purpose, and I bless them for it and that’s all good, but I don’t know that it’s going to change our direction.” Commissioners agreed 5-0 in December to examine revised rules for the swath, reallocating 45 MHz for Wi-Fi, with 20 MHz reserved for C-V2X and 10 for DSRC. Opponents of the NPRM should drop their rhetoric that the FCC is putting lives in danger, O’Rielly said. “Stop all the hyperbole and let’s get down to math,” he said: The need for automotive safety and for spectrum is “a balancing act.” No one on the [show] floor is planning to offer DSRC in any vehicle anytime soon,” O’Rielly said: “The previous offers have been withdrawn.” O’Rielly will “defer” to Chairman Ajit Pai on working with the Transportation Department on the 5.9 GHz band. O’Rielly isn’t ready to fully embrace autonomous vehicles. “I’m not anywhere close to that,” he said. “My dad didn’t even like to drive an automatic. He was more of a manual guy.” O’Rielly noted his father sold used cars and a General Motors plant was in his hometown. The move to C-V2X has been a theme at the show. Audi, the Virginia Department of Transportation and Qualcomm Technologies announced plans Wednesday for a C-V2X pilot on northern Virginia roads in Q3 (see 2001220028). Eric Meyhofer, head of Uber's Advanced Technologies Group, said during a presentation Thursday that driverless cars will cut costs and are important especially in rural markets. Uber drivers tend to “stay just in the city core,” he said: “They don’t go out too far because they’re running empty and that’s not high utilization and that’s not cost effective,” he said. “A self-driving car 'can sit and wait'” and will go “more places," he added. "It gives more access.”

Audi, the Virginia Department of Transportation and Qualcomm Technologies announced plans Wednesday for initial deployment of cellular vehicle-to-everything on northern Virginia roads in Q3. The C-V2X deployment uses the same part of the 5.9 GHz band the FCC proposed to allocate for C-V2X (see 1912180019), Qualcomm said. Efforts are “designed to focus on improving safety for construction workers and motorists alike,” Qualcomm said. C-V2X is “a new and promising technology that is gaining momentum in the automotive industry as it enables communications between cars, infrastructure, cyclists, pedestrians, and road workers,” said FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. He noted the pilot requires an experimental license because rules haven’t changed.

The FCC Office of Engineering and Technology approved Ford's application to test cellular-vehicle-to-everything technology in the 5.9 GHz band. Ford is allowed to run tests for two years along a road in the Detroit area. Commissioners approved 5-0 in December an NPRM seeking to reallocate the 5.9 GHz band for Wi-Fi and C-V2X, while potentially preserving a sliver for dedicated short-range communications (see 1912120058).

General Motors is bringing SiriusXM’s 360L service to 1 million vehicles on 13 Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac models, the companies said Tuesday. A connected access plan and a SiriusXM All Access or SiriusXM Select subscription is required. 360L combines satellite and streaming delivery of 200-plus live SiriusXM channels and on-demand programming. Eligible models have a three-month subscription to SiriusXM All Access, which offers in-vehicle plus app-based listening.

Groups representing automakers and state highway officials lobbied FCC members to keep the entire 75 MHz of 5.85-5.925 GHz for vehicle-to-everything technology for now, and supporting deployment of dedicated short range communications (DSRC) and cellular vehicle to everything (C-V2X). A draft rulemaking set for commissioners' vote Thursday proposes keeping the upper 30 MHz of the 5.9 GHz band for intelligent transportation systems and vehicle safety communications, repurposing the lower 45 MHz for unlicensed like Wi-Fi (see 1911200055). Intelligent Transportation Society of America and the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials have "concerns about the paucity of data regarding the ability of unlicensed devices, DSRC and C-V2X to share the 5.9 GHz Band in the manner proposed," said postings (here and here) Monday in docket 19-138. "Withhold [the] NPRM until test results regarding the potential for harmful interference throughout the band are available," they asked. ITS America CEO Shailen Bhatt and AASHTO Deputy Director Brandye Hendrickson were among attendees at meetings including FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel. The groups "would support sharing of the band between licensed and unlicensed services provided that testing is completed and demonstrates that unlicensed devices will not cause harmful interference to licensed services," emailed ITS America lawyer Robert Kelly of Patton Boggs, who wrote the filings. Others back the NPRM, including NCTA, with a filing also posted Monday. The agency declined to comment.

Ford remains willing to share the 5.9 GHz band if it can be shown non-safety applications won't degrade cellular vehicle-to-everything technology (C-V2X) performance or jeopardize the future availability of the spectrum, CEO James Hackett wrote FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, who tweeted the letter Monday. Hackett said Ford will begin deploying C-V2X in 2022, and all its new vehicles will have it within a few years. It said the proceeding considering C-V2X as a crash avoidance technology is "appropriate and timely." Dec. 12, commissioners vote on a proposal to take some band from dedicated short-range communications and reallocate it for Wi-Fi and other unlicensed use (see 1911200055).

Google, which announced a call 911 feature during the Pixel 4 launch Tuesday (see 1910150046), added more safety-oriented tools for smartphones in the car on Thursday. It also gave iPhone users, for the first time, the ability to report crashes, speed traps and traffic slowdowns, a feature that’s been popular on Android phones, blogged Sandra Tseng, product manager-Google Maps. Google is bringing more tools “that reflect real-time contributions” from the Google Maps community to keep users informed behind the wheel, Tseng said. Users can also report new types of incidents that affect travel time -- construction, lane closures, disabled vehicles and debris on the road -- by tapping the plus sign in Google Maps and then adding a report, she said.

An upcoming National Electrical Manufacturers Association standard could accelerate deployment of connected vehicle roadside infrastructure technology, said the association at an Intelligent Transportation Society of Georgia (ITSGA) meeting Monday. NEMA TS 10, commissioned by the NEMA Transportation Management Systems Section, is a harmonized technical specification for traffic signals, crosswalk signs, flashing school zone safety beacons, ramp meters and other electronic traffic control equipment, it said. A vital component of the connected vehicle ecosystem is the ability for vehicles and the infrastructure to communicate with each other regardless of the type of device or underlying technology, NEMA said, saying with the standard, dedicated short-range communications and cellular vehicle to everything can work together in the same spectrum via a dual-mode or dual active roadside connected vehicle device. “NEMA TS 10 will enable user agencies to have confidence in procuring roadside infrastructure equipment that will not become obsolete as communication technology advances,” said Steve Griffith, NEMA transportation industry director. A technical committee is drafting the standard, expected to be completed by year-end.

CalAmp CEO Michael Burdiek “would anticipate” his company’s new Sprint IoT “strategic partnership” agreement will “survive” T-Mobile/Sprint, he said on a fiscal Q2 call Thursday “There would be no reason for it not to.” CalAmp will supply Sprint “intelligent telematics” devices and “device-as-a-service” (DaaS) subscription services. It's a telematics “resell arrangement,” and will “expand Sprint's broad range of connected car, fleet and asset management services,” said Burdiek. Sprint “was really keen” on the DaaS program, “because they see it as a way to lower friction for customer adoption” of telematics services, he said. CalAmp also has a partnership with “another North American telecom service provider” he didn’t name as a reseller of telematics “solutions targeting specific verticals,” he said. “We see carrier partnerships, both domestically and outside the United States, as being ready channels to take some of these software and service solutions into specific verticals in certain regions around the world.” It’s a “real, real nice growth opportunity” for CalAmp, “which we really didn't exercise in the past,” he said.