Wireless Spectrum Auctions

T-Mobile won't face capacity issues as it expands its home internet service, executives said on a call with analysts Thursday (see 2210270077). CEO Mike Sievert said T-Mobile probably added more new high-speed internet during Q3 than AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and Charter combined, and now serves more than 2 million. T-Mobile is “adding more spectrum across the footprint, both the existing and the new footprint,” said Neville Ray, president-technology: “That's not just in 2.5 GHz now; we're also adding PCS in the 1900 MHz band to those sites. So we have more sites and more spectrum coming online as we move through the future months and years for the company.” Sievert said T-Mobile has “barely tapped” its millimeter-wave assets. “We have fantastic mid-band,” he said. The recent 2.5 GHz auction “has given us potential access, as soon as those licenses are assigned, to significant additional mid-band in areas where we actually already have the towers deployed,” he said. Sievert said new customers sign up predominantly because they’re not satisfied with their contracts with another carrier, “or they switch because they want a different or more powerful network signal,” he said: “More and more they are learning that T-Mobile is the company that offers that.” MoffettNathanson’s Craig Moffett said he remains positive on the outlook for T-Mobile despite broader industry questions. “If there’s a single cause for anxiousness among T-Mobile shareholders -- beyond simply how well T-Mobile’s stock has performed -- it is this: industry subscriber growth is destined to slow,” he said: “With Cable taking a larger and larger share of a dwindling pool of new growth, T-Mobile will struggle to meet expectations for net adds.” Moffett said questions remain about how wireless phone growth continues. “It looks as though industry growth may have reaccelerated in Q3 -- we won’t know until all the numbers are in, but there’s an interesting, if depressing, theory that growth might have benefited from ‘the Uvalde effect,’ with parents feeling an urgent need for their children to have their own cellphones at an earlier age in the event of a school shooting,” he said, referring to the May school shooting in Texas. T-Mobile closed up 7.4% Friday at $151.

NTIA intends to open a planned request for comment as part of its work to move forward on a national spectrum strategy (see 2209190061) “sooner rather than later,” but there’s no specific timeline, Senior Spectrum Adviser Scott Harris said Wednesday during a Georgetown University Center for Business and Public Policy event. House Communications Subcommittee Chief GOP Counsel Kate O’Connor, meanwhile, urged the Senate Commerce Committee to advance the House-passed Spectrum Innovation Act (HR-7624) and faulted the House Commerce Committee's recent oversight of interagency spectrum policy infighting.

Wireless mic maker Shure updated the FCC on its stance on rules for TV white spaces (TVWS) devices, amplifying earlier comments (see 2207050059). Shure said again in a filing posted Tuesday in docket 14-165 its principal concern in this proceeding is ensuring that wireless microphone users can rely on robust interference protections for the clear, uninterrupted, real-time wireless microphone transmissions that are critical to these users.” In their comments, the Open Technology Institute at New America, Public Knowledge and Microsoft “all decry the lack of available spectrum in the Television Bands in urban, suburban and even rural areas for white space devices (WSDs) as a problem that is particularly burdensome to WSD users,” Shure said: The three “are correct in their base assertion, indeed after two auctions and channel repacking, there is very little TVWS spectrum left. However, this is an even bigger problem for the thousands of microphones, licensed and unlicensed, supporting events and content creation and should not be viewed solely as a limit on the relatively few WSDs currently being utilized in the market.”

FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr said the FCC should launch a rulemaking on higher power levels for the citizens broadband radio service band, saying that could be helpful to wireless ISPs, in a prerecorded interview with new WISP Association President David Zumwalt. The interview was aired Wednesday at a WISPA meeting in Las Vegas. “It’s worth asking the question, teeing it up,” Carr said. “There are certainly some use cases, particularly in rural communities where upping the power … might allow you from your existing tower site to reach one more home, one more business,” he said of CBRS changes: “At the end of the day, WISPs are so connected to their communities. … WISPs are scrappy. WISPs are getting the job done.” The FCC didn't comment. Carr said the FCC needs to get moving on other spectrum initiative as well, including on client-to-client devices in 6 GHz and the UNII2c band. WISPs are “looking for ways to have some stability in the ability to plan on what kind of spectrum they need to be prepared for, whether it’s licensed or unlicensed, and over what period of time they can roll that out,” Zumwalt said. His members are paying close attention to all the spectrum decisions being made at the FCC, he said. The FCC wants to offer licenses covering smaller geographic areas where possible, Carr said. “Maybe every single auction we might not get right ... but hopefully, over a course of years, we are doing some small geographies, some large geographies, and people are seeing a healthy mix,” he said. WISPA members have continuing concerns about NTIA’s broadband, equity, access and deployment program notice of funding opportunity (NOFO) and appreciate the questions that have been raised by Carr (see 2207210064), Zumwalt said: “It should have been more technology neutral and inclusive.” Carr said it looked to him like NTIA made “a lot of the right cuts” in the NOFO but “there was some political turning of the dials at the last minute.” Carr agreed about the need to refocus the NOFO. “We love fiber, we want tons of fiber,” he said. “But we need to be open-minded … for last-mile technologies, including fixed wireless,” he said. “We love fiber too,” Zumwalt responded: “But we love fiber in the right place, in the right circumstance.” Carr said insisting on a fiber-only approach means telling people “you need to wait on the wrong side of the digital divide years longer than necessary.” The FCC faces challenges delivering on a broadband map, expected in November, Carr said. “I don’t know that we have to hit a bulls-eye” with the initial map “but we have to at least get it in the strike zone,” he said. Carr said he hopes the FCC doesn’t revisit reclassifying broadband as a Communications Act Title II service. “That’s just a backward looking debate,” he said. Title II and possible price controls, “really that’s a 2005 debate,” he said.

Wireless carriers remain hopeful on the outlook for the 3.1-3.45 GHz band, despite recent comments by John Sherman, DOD chief information officer, about the high costs and long time frame for clearing the spectrum (see 2209190061). Industry experts note spectrum in recent FCC auctions has come with some protection for incumbent users, which will likely also be the case for 3.1 GHz.

Congress is buying itself more time to continue negotiations on a potential spectrum legislative package by agreeing to temporarily extend the FCC’s auction authority through Dec. 16 (see 2209210076), but the breathing room hasn’t appreciably improved prospects those talks will result in a deal by the new deadline, lawmakers and lobbyists told us last week. The House voted 230-201 Friday to pass a continuing resolution that includes the FCC renewal and an extension of federal appropriations to the Dec. 16 date (HR-6833). The Senate approved it Thursday (see 2209290066). President Joe Biden was expected to sign the measure before FY 2022 appropriations expired late Friday.

A new CTIA-funded study by Accenture said the U.S. wireless industry has access to only 5% of lower mid-band spectrum, while unlicensed spectrum users have access to seven times as much, government users 12 times. The study proposes three bands for licensed use. The 3.1-3.45 GHz band “offers reliable coverage and adequate range of coverage, making it ideal for 5G data traffic,” the study said: “This band is adjacent to the recently auctioned 3.45 GHz band, which would help drive lower costs for device manufacturers when developing products for a wider contiguous band,” the study said. The 4.4-4.94 GHz band “has been allocated to wireless carriers in many other nations, meaning a similar allocation in the U.S. would support international harmonization efforts yielding cost benefits,” Accenture advised: “The 7 to 8.4 GHz range is a significant block of higher frequency contiguous spectrum. The capacity characteristics of this range make it ideal for serving densely populated areas such as urban centers, where traffic requirements are greater.”

Small and regional carriers are taking different approaches to 5G and fixed wireless, said Eric Boudriau, Ericsson North America head-customer unit regional carriers, at the Competitive Carriers Association conference Wednesday. “Everybody starts from a different position,” he said. Fixed wireless is “really, really accelerating” in the U.S. and internationally, he said. Other executives stressed the importance of addressing federal infrastructure rules to better fund wireless. The discussion was streamed live from Portland, Oregon.

Some industry officials say the national spectrum strategy the Biden administration is expected to release will have the most value if the administration lays out with more granularity mid-band spectrum that is targeted for 5G, and eventually 6G. The plan was the focus of a day-long NTIA forum Sept. 19 (see 2209190061). Experts agreed it will likely take six months or longer to put a strategy together.

Congress “must find common ground” on extending the FCC’s spectrum auction authority past its current Sept. 30 expiration, even if it’s for a short period, former FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly said Thursday in an InsideSources opinion piece. “To do otherwise would set a horrible precedent, setting back wireless communications policy at precisely the wrong moment.” Lawmakers appear to be nearing a deal to temporarily renew the FCC’s authority through Dec. 16 as part of a pending continuing resolution to extend federal appropriations (see 2209210076). The Senate plans an initial vote at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to CR shell bill HR-6833 (see 2209220087). “Extending auction authority must have balanced expectations and a modicum of innate responsibility,” O’Rielly said: “To get more commercial wireless spectrum into the market, all affected parties must come to the table ready to deal.” Getting “an extended commercial spectrum pipeline, which is critical, will likely take longer than a few months to hammer out,” he said: “Experience tells us that it will be a long process that could take the better part of a year and only occurs with the inclusion of a firm deadline in law and corresponding watchful eyes by the respective congressional telecom leaders.”