Before allowing federal users to operate in spectrum bands shared by satellite and upper microwave flexible use services, the FCC must issue a Further NPRM with band-specific proposals, satellite industry representatives said in a meeting with agency officials, per a docket 13-115 ex parte post Tuesday. Satellite officials also said any nonexclusive spectrum licensing for commercial space launch and reentry should focus on prelaunch coordination, and use of entire bands -- such as 2200-2290 MHz, 420-430 MHz and 2025-2110 MHz bands -- should be considered instead of specific sub-bands. Meeting with International and Wireless bureaus and Office of Engineering and Technology staffers were representatives of the Satellite Industry Association, ABS, United Launch Alliance, Intelsat, Amazon, SpaceX, Lockheed Martin, EchoStar, AWS, SES and Telesat.

EchoStar's HughesNet satellite broadband service ended the company's most-recent quarter with 1.51 million subscribers in the U.S. and Latin America, down 32,000 from the previous quarter, with ongoing capacity constraints, Hughes Network Systems President Pradman Kaul said Tuesday as EchoStar announced its Q3 2021 results. EchoStar Satellite Services President Anders Johnson said its Jupiter 3 broadband satellite will launch in the second half of 2022. He said EchoStar and Dish Network are jointly evaluating how some Dish U.S. licenses for AWS-4 and S-band spectrum might be used in meshing EchoStar's services internationally with Dish's planned U.S. terrestrial network. EchoStar said total revenue for the quarter was $504.7 million, up $31.2 million year over year.

Continuing to require that Amazon obtain a "joint effect" finding from the ITU creates uncertainty and delay for its Kuiper constellation, company executives told FCC International Bureau Chief Tom Sullivan, per a bureau ex parte filing Monday. It also imposes a regulatory hurdle on it that other non-geostationary orbit constellations don't face, the company said. Any delay in deciding what to do about Amazon's petition also creates uncertainty for other NGSO operators, it said. Kuiper wants the ITU finding condition to be removed from its 2020 constellation authorization (see 2108090003).

Viasat's proposed $7.3 billion acquisition of Inmarsat is "a complex transaction involving a variety of necessary approvals to be obtained before closing," a company spokesperson emailed us Tuesday in response to our question about what regulatory approvals will be needed (see 2111080038). The companies "will be positioned to accelerate innovation, deliver enhanced quality of service, provide more product choice, and deliver greater value to existing and new customers, in a robustly competitive marketplace featuring a large number of capable suppliers, with additional satellite capacity constantly coming online."

SpaceX closed on its takeover of Swarm, said an FCC International Bureau consummation notice Friday. The bureau approved transfer of Swarm's satellite and earth station licenses in September.

FCC OK of transferring Intelsat operations to new ownership when it emerges from Chapter 11 bankruptcy won't affect Intelsat's existing license condition about the International Telecommunications Satellite Organization or the terms of its public service agreement with ITSO, Intelsat said in a docket 21-375 filing Friday. Intelsat said ITSO’s call for the commission to involve itself in Intelsat/ITSO contract terms (see 2110260028) is outside the scope of the proceeding or the federal agency's purview.

Amazon's Kuiper makes no attempt to show that its 2020 constellation authorization, without a requirement it get an ITU finding on the joint effect of its multiple ITU filings, would guarantee compliance with equivalent power flux density limits, Viasat told the FCC International Bureau Wednesday. Viasat said Kuiper also hasn't shown that without the "joint effect" requirement it's seeking to have removed (see 2108090003) that geostationary orbit system operators would be protected from its non-geostationary operations. While disagreeing with Kuiper arguments that the requirement violates the Administrative Procedure Act by not being applied previously to SpaceX, Viasat said it might be good for the FCC to harmonize its NGSO authorizations approach to the joint effect and related requirements. Amazon didn't comment Thursday.

Boeing's planned 147-satellite non-geostationary orbit V-band broadband constellation received FCC commissioners' OK Wednesday. Approval has been pending since 2017 (see 1703020036). Boeing emailed that the approval lets it move ahead with launch and operation but didn't give specifics on a time frame. "While the application was in review with the FCC, we have continued work identifying compelling use cases for V-band and maturing the underlying technology," it said. Per the order, Commissioner Geoffrey Starks didn't participate in the decision. His office said that voluntarily and out of what it called an abundance of caution, he didn't take part "because he owes a small amount of Boeing stock and the item specifically involves the company as the applicant." The order approved Boeing plans for inter-satellite links in parts of the V and Ka bands but rejected them in other parts of the bands, citing their not being allocated internationally for such operations under ITU rules. See our news bulletin here.

Lynk said implications raised by its proposed satellite-provided mobile service should be considered at another time, but the FCC "should decline Lynk's invitation to act first and think later," Hughes told the International Bureau Friday. Lynk obviously has bigger plans than a 10-satellite constellation once it gets U.S. customers, and another company, AST, also has a pending application to provide similar service, Hughes said. It urged instead denial or deferred action on Lynk's application until the broader issues are addressed. Lynk outside counsel didn't comment Monday.

Amazon asked for FCC OK to put up two Ka-band satellites by Q4 2022 as an early step toward its non-geostationary orbit broadband constellation Kuiper. KuiperSat-1 and KuiperSat-2 "are an important step in the development process," letting it test the communications and network technology to be used in the final satellite design and validate launch operations and mission management procedures, it blogged Monday. In an experimental license application, Amazon said Kuiper would orbit at 590 kilometers altitude. It said there would be two launches via ABL Space Systems. It said it's designing and testing Kuiper at a 219,000-square-foot facility in Redmond, and is adding 20,000 additional square feet of capacity. It said Kuiper employs more than 750 and plans to add "hundreds more" in 2022.