Dish Network subscribers in Wisconsin may receive a bill credit as part of a settlement reached after an investigation into consumer complaints by the state Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection, said a news release from DATCP. The settlement includes $225,000 in civil forfeitures and assessments and a $4.25 bill credit to thousands of eligible customers, the release said. The settlement requires Dish to make changes to its communications with Wisconsin customers whenever Dish increases prices on satellite television offerings that are subject to an early termination fee, it said. "While we respectfully disagree with the allegations in the complaint filed by the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection, we appreciate their constructive feedback regarding our communications with our customers," said a Dish spokesman. "We are pleased to amicably resolve this matter, so that we can continue to focus on providing outstanding customer service and the best value in pay-TV.”

The FCC denial of Dish Network’s $3.3 billion in AWS-3 auction bidding discounts “is clearly an unfavorable development for the company as the resulting significant cash outlays could further weaken the balance sheet and liquidity” and force “negative credit rating actions,” Moody’s said Wednesday in a research note. Much depends on how Dish finances the $3.3 billion obligation and manages its “credit metrics,” Moody’s said. Paying back the $3.3 billion in discounts would leave Dish with “less to work with,” possibly imperiling the company’s mergers and acquisitions activities, Dish CEO Charlie Ergen said on an Aug. 5 earnings call (see 1508050042).

Dish Network finished integration of its Hopper DVR with control modules put out by AMX, Crestron, Pro Control and RTI, the company said in a news release. They follow Control4, which released an IP module for Hopper to dealers in 2014. Dish said Tuesday the integration speeds up installation and lets dealers add IP control to the system. Dish opened its third-party application programming interface in 2013, allowing Hopper to be tied into home environmental and security control systems, with a single interface operating all of them.

LightSquared's compatibility testing is duplicative of federal Transportation Department efforts, and its methodology is questionable, the GPS Innovation Alliance said in an FCC filing posted Monday in docket 12-340. The filing is in response to testing LightSquared began in July of possible interference between its broadband uplink and downlink signals and neighboring spectrum GPS signals (see 1507160045). While LightSquared has solicited feedback from the GPS industry on the testing, being done by Roberson and Associates, GPS Innovation Alliance said it "will focus its technical efforts" on the DOT assessment of adjacent band compatibility issues, the draft test plan of which is expected to be released soon. The LightSquared testing "would reinvent any number of test methods and acceptable criteria" that have been sent out by the ITU and the International Civil Aviation Authority among others, and an issue of a sole service provider "is not an appropriate place for domestic modification of established international standards," GPSIA said. In a separate filing in the docket posted Monday, the American Meteorological Society and National Weather Association said the FCC should go through "careful deliberation regarding the options and their consequences" before allowing any sharing of the 1675-1695 MHz band by meteorological and hydrological users and broadband. LightSquared's plans would have it using a downlink at 1670-1675 MHz, while NTIA is looking at 1675-1695 as the subject of a possible auction in the future, AMS and NWA said. "The choice of which spectrum bands are shared should not endanger the reliability or the effectiveness of public safety meteorological and hydrological data flow" from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration satellites, and thus should not happen "unless it can be confirmed that no loss or interruption of the critical life-saving operations currently using it will occur," the two said. In a filing to be posted in docket 12-340, LightSquared said Tuesday that since the initial DOT testing plan was released in December 2012, "so far not a single device has yet been tested, nor has any end date of testing been identified." It also said GPSIA's questioning of the standards Roberson is following in its testing "is wholly incorrect" and that the organization "provides no specific criticisms of any of the standards proposed by Roberson that would allow substantiation of such a claim." The testing "needs to proceed in a timely way in order to provide relevant input ... and will do so notwithstanding GPSIA’s failure to contribute," LightSquared said. In a separate filing to be posted in the docket, it said it "agrees that any sharing of this spectrum must ensure that NOAA and the National Weather Service can carry out the critical functions described by AMS and NWA." Citing studies done by Alion Science & Technology filed last year, LightSquared said such spectrum sharing "is technically feasible" and that it "has undertaken additional close study of the spectrum, including services received by non-NOAA entities, and plans to file a further study shortly, providing further assurance that the critical operations described by AMS and NWA can be protected."

Sharp and Kymeta signed an agreement for Sharp to use its LCD production technology to make Kymeta flat-panel satellite antennas, Kymeta said Tuesday. The new antenna platform -- developed over three years -- will obviate the use of mechanical steering equipment and can be electronically pointed and steered, Kymeta said.

Epson said it began shipping the Runsense SF-110 GPS watch ($139) designed for runners and hikers who want to track workouts and monitor daily activities. The fitness wearable measures steps, calories burned, distance, pace, time, laps and altitude, said the company. Users can set three customizable screens with up to nine real-time measurements, it said in a Tuesday news release. Runsense SF-110 users can sync their data with the Epson Run Connect app available for Android and iOS devices or with MapMyRun and Strava apps. Users can also enable Assisted GPS through Run Connect to download GPS satellite data directly to the watch for a faster initial GPS connection, Epson said.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency signed a one-year contract with SES for O3b Networks’ services and ground equipment for use at the National Weather Service office in Pago Pago, American Samoa, SES said in a Monday news release. It said the NOAA contract will help the agency expand its broadband connectivity outside the continental U.S. for wider dissemination of weather and data forecasting.

The third satellite in Inmarsat's Global Xpress constellation, Inmarsat-5 F3, is scheduled to launch Aug. 28, with the company's global commercial high-speed broadband service expected to commence by the end of the year, the satellite company said in a Monday news release. The satellite is to go up from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. F3 will cover the Pacific Ocean region as part of Global Xpress' global high-speed broadband service. F1 was launched in December 2013.

Gilat Satellite Networks and Space Star Technology jointly will provide the satellite communications network for ChinaSat 16, the first Ka-band high-throughput multispot-beam satellite in China, Gilat said in a Wednesday news release. Gilat's contributions will include its SkyEdge II-c technology in the network segments and very small aperture terminals, and consulting with Space Star, Gilat said.

The FCC International Bureau approved blanket authority for Inmarsat to operate its aircraft-mounted GX Terminals, which will provide high-speed satellite broadband services to aviation customers over its Global Xpress Ka-band satellite network. The approval, given Tuesday, lets the JetWave MCS-8200 and MCS-8000 terminals communicate with Inmarsat-5 F2, one of the satellites in its Global Xpress constellation, due to launch in coming months.