This interesting article over at Phonescoop.com breaks down the geographical areas of the just-completed FCC AWS (advanced wireless services) auctions. There are some maps that clearly explain what is in store for winning bidders in the recent auctions.
As the article clearly points out -- and you can see once you look at the RF allocation map for the U.S. -- radio spectrum is the single biggest strategic asset to any company that operates anywhere in the wireless arena.
Forget phones, service plans, text messaging charges, EV-DO and HSDPA data and anything else. If you don't have the radio spectrum to deploy what you need, you won't have customers. This is why T-Mobile -- which has become starved for spectrum in its push to get 3G to market -- was the largest AWS bidder at over $4 billion.
Looks like AT&T is greasing the cookie sheets of regulators from the FCC by offering up broadband plans and specifically, wireless broadband plans for up to 10 trials in existing Bellsouth network areas in the 2.3 or 2.5 GHz spectrum that the combined company will own.
There were rumors that a last-minute look at overlapping wireless infrastructure divesting may cause a delay in the merger, but this move by AT&T will most likely not cause that to happen -- even if it's just an overture towards getting the merger approved as quickly as possible.
MediaFLO, the very promising technology from CDMA pioneer Qualcomm that is in the process of being used on some CDMA networks for delivering high-quality mobile multimedia, has gained approval from the FCC to use television channels 54, 55 or 56 until the transition to digital TV happens in 2009 nationwide.
"Today's ruling is a big win for consumers, who will soon be able to enjoy new and exciting mobile TV experiences from MediaFLO USA," said Gina Lombardi, president of MediaFLO USA. "This ruling enables MediaFLO USA to launch its services to millions of customers across the nation."
MediaFLO is a "forward link only" (the FLO) technology that was designed to give broadcasters and content products another mode in which to reach America's consumers. With over-the-air television, cable, satellite and now MediaFLO all competing for the delivery mechanism, times are sure heating up in an interesting way.
Looks like the short road to creating the nation's largest telephone (and telecom) company is just hours away. Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Justice approved the merger between AT&T and Bellsouth, clearing the largest hurdle before the companies actually make the merger happen on paper.
With on of the FCC commissioners dissenting quite a bit, the matter now goes up before the FCC today after the DOJ's action yesterday. What will the FCC do? Most likely, the merger will be approved there as well, FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein said that "today's move by the Department of Justice to approve the proposed AT&T-BellSouth combination without condition is a reckless abandonment of DOJ's responsibility to protect competition and consumers."
With AT&T and Bellsouth just about there in terms of receiving approval to merge, one of the five ranking Republicans on the FCC's board that will be voting for or against the merger has said that he will drop of of the voting process due to a conflict of interest. Wow -- a politician who has some sort of conscience. Stop the presses, please.
The vote on the huge $67 billion merger could be delayed because this news -- when combined with controversy over wireless broadband spectrum, special-access lines and other politically charged issues -- may force the FCC to delay voting on the merger until the voting issue can be resolved.
When it comes to ensuring customers are *protected* in each individual state, the states and the FCC just can't come to an agreement on just who should be able to regulate statewide wireless activity.
A three judge panel in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals just ruled that the Federal Communications Commission cannot pre-empt the states' right to define billing practices for wireless carriers and other utilities. In other words, the FCC has lost for now, and the states march on should anything happen with customers regarding wireless billing snafus.
Looks like the FCC is definitely wanting to promote the rapid buildout of new wireless networks that will surely start arising soon after the recently conclusion of the FCC's advanced wireless auctions.
The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA) -- the wireless industry's largest lobbying group (among other things), has agreed to act as a "cost-sharing clearinghouse" to assist the FCC in relocating parts of the radio spectrum so that the efficient design and rollouts of new networks can being as soon as possible.
Since radio relocation is not cheap, the clearinghouse setup by the CTIA just makes it that much safer for changes -- rapid changes -- to start happening. Now.
With Leap Wireless now quasi-owning quite a substantial portion of wireless spectrum based on its bid results in the just-completed FCC advanced wireless auction, the company looks to sell some of that wireless real estate soon.
Leap, though, looks to substantially build out service in metro areas where it won licenses, but "look at other options" for rural areas where it also won spectrum in the auctions. In other words, Leap will probably be looking to sell those assets very soon.
In a filing with the SEC, Leap said this -- "based on our preliminary analysis of the auction 66 licenses ... that are located in new markets, we believe that a significant portion of the pops included within such new licenses may not be well-suited for Cricket service." Cricket is Leap's brand of wireless service sold to customers under that name. In addition to that small nugget which doesn't really say much, this addition does: "we may seek to partner with other, sell spectrum or pursue alternative products or services to utilize or benefit from the spectrum not otherwise used for Cricket service."
With Sprint and four national cable operators recently plunking down $2.37 billion for national wireless licenses in the FCC's advanced wireless services auctions, many were left wondering what the strategy was. After all, Sprint already owns a bevy of spectrum nationally is is poised to be able and ramp up next-gen services faster than anyone due to owning existing spectrum.
Well, with the partnership of Comcast Corporation, Time Warner Cable, Cox Communications and Advance/Newhouse, Sprint is apparently going to attack the established telcos with the help of its cable partners in a classic fight to win the customer. With AT&T now controlling so much telecom access -- once the Bellsouth merger is complete -- Sprint needed to side with other powerful partners to slay the AT&T dragon and stave off the threat -- and it found the perfect old telco nemesis to do that -- national cable companies.
ADT, the national security company, has asked the FCC to extend its 2008 deadline to have its aging analog cellular security devices replaced with more modern digital cellular equipment for security monitoring purposes.
Shouldn't ADT have been working on this in like, 2002 or something? Back in 2000, when digital cellular started to really overtake analog lines, any company or industry involved with security monitoring over analog cellular should have started transitioning to digital. Perhaps ADT did, and it's really taken all this time to make the switch.
Telular is the only digital wireless monitoring service available, using GSM. No CDMA monitoring solutions exist yet. Talk about a rather important industry that appears to be way behind the wireless times.
With the FCC's advanced wireless services auction now completed, T-Mobile was the clear winner in terms of bids for radio spectrum in just about every possible corner of the U.S. and even into Alaska. What does T-Mobile plan to deploy in...Alaska?
Well, first of all, Anchorage is a highly-populated city and even though most of Alaska is not inhabited, the major cities in that state have telecommunications needs like anyone else in any American city. T-Mobile spent $1.1 million for the Anchorage market in the auction, and thanks to that bid, Anchorage will be right up there with advanced wireless services when they start to be deployed by T-Mobile.
With the AT&T and Bellsouth $67 million merger set to be approved in mid-October, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin apparently is not listening to concerns by wireless industry and consumer advocates about special-access lines and wireless broadband spectrum. Hmm, a government rep turning a deaf ear to legit concerns. What else is new?
The AT&T-Bellsouth merger should be under as much scrutiny as possible to ensure customers -- existing and potential -- don't get the shaft from this upcoming corporate behemoth. With so much potential control over so many important telecom areas, this merger deserves close inspection and special rulings at every conceivable corner if you ask me.
As we say goodbye to the summer and head into the fall, why not dive into the Top 5 stories we've been working on this week at The Wireless Report? Enjoy!
The debate continues over kids bringing cellphones to school There's quite a bit of discussion and debate over whether kids should be allowed to bring and/or use their cellphones while in school. It seems there is no clearcut answer, one way or the other.
The Wireless Report Podcast, Special Edition -- September 20, 2006 We are pleased to bring you a special edition of the The Wireless Report Podcast. I recently spoke with Peter Cannistra from Sprint Nextel and Gary Koerper from Motorola. Both gentlemen are personally and deeply involved with the WiMAX standard and rollout recently announced by Sprint Nextel and had some great insight into this rather-important WiMAX announcement.
Mobile TV has captured the "industry's" attention -- what about the consumer? In yet another interesting line about the mobile industry preaching the effects of mobile television, it still bugs me that the *industry* won't really ask their specific customers exactly what *they* want. After all, the *industry* can harp about mobile TV all day long -- but at the end of the day, if consumers don't bit, then the entire effort has been wasted.
Now that the FCC advanced wireless services auction has been completed, just what will the nation's wireless landscape look like 10 years from now? A good start at this question would probably come from looking at the overall higher bidders in the auction, since now these companies and entities have to deploy strategies to pay for all those billions in spectrum costs -- by giving customers something that they will buy.
The FCC auction ended with these top bidders -- T-Mobile USA, Verizon Wireless, SpectrumCo (Sprint's venture with several cable companies), Metro PCS and Cingular Wireless. MetroPCS was the only huge surprise here, as it is a rather small regional wireless company compared to the larger national carriers. With very few smaller bidders anywhere in the auction, it seems like just the larger wireless telecom companies will get larger and larger, as smaller companies will, well, offer what they can to compete.
With T-Mobile the clear winner in the recently-concluded FCC advanced wireless services auction, what is the fourth-largest U.S. wireless carrier going to do with all that new radio spectrum?
The licenses T-Mobile acquired are for regions across the U.S. and in Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands and Alaska. Cities including New York, Los Angeles and Chicago were also part of T-Mobile's bidding.
This will allow T-Mobile to expand its footprint to be competitive with U.S. market leaders Cingular Wireless, Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel as well as build out 3G services including more advanced data networks, mobile multimedia and other newer features that require quite a bit of bandwidth and expertise. T-Mobile has fallen behind since the company does not have the licenses the other carriers do -- until now, that is.
This interesting article over at Phonescoop.com breaks down the geographical areas of the just-completed FCC AWS (advanced wireless services) auctions. There are some maps that clearly explain what is in store for winning bidders in the recent auctions.
Looks like AT&T is greasing the cookie sheets of 
MediaFLO, the very promising technology from CDMA pioneer Qualcomm that is in the process of being used on some CDMA networks for delivering high-quality mobile multimedia, has 
Looks like the short road to creating the nation's largest telephone (and telecom) company is just hours away. Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Justice approved the merger between AT&T and Bellsouth, 
With AT&T and Bellsouth just about there in terms of 
When it comes to ensuring customers are *protected* in each individual state, the states and the FCC 
Looks like the FCC is definitely wanting to promote the rapid buildout of new wireless networks that will surely start arising soon after the recently conclusion of the FCC's advanced wireless auctions.
With Leap Wireless now quasi-owning quite a substantial portion of wireless spectrum based on its bid results in the just-completed FCC advanced wireless auction, the company looks to sell some of that wireless real estate soon. 
With Sprint and four national cable operators recently plunking down $2.37 billion for 
ADT, the national security company, has asked the FCC to extend 
With the FCC's advanced wireless services auction now completed, T-Mobile was the clear winner in terms of bids for radio spectrum in just about every possible corner of the U.S. and even into Alaska. What does T-Mobile plan to deploy in...
With the AT&T and Bellsouth $67 million merger set to be approved in mid-October, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin 
As we say goodbye to the summer and head into the fall, why not dive into the Top 5 stories we've been working on this week at The Wireless Report? Enjoy!
With T-Mobile 
