Pai Says 3.5 GHz Auction Will Start in June, Addressing Carrier Mid-Band Concerns

The FCC will start the long-awaited 3.5 GHz auction June 25, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said Wednesday in a blog on the agenda for the Sept. 25 commissioners’ meeting. The FCC will also take up USF funding for Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands (see 1909040028), a proposal to update intercarrier compensation rules and a media modernization Further NPRM, among other items.

“We’ve already completed two spectrum auctions this year and will begin a third on December 10,” Pai said. The next step is seeking comment on procedures for an auction of priority access licenses in the citizens broadband radio service band, he said. The auction is expected to be the FCC’s first of critical mid-band spectrum in the 5G era. The band is expected to get more use by carriers than for Wi-Fi.

“Very pleased @FCC is moving on next step to make #CBRS (3.5 GHz) license auction happen,” tweeted Commissioner Mike O’Rielly, who oversaw a rewrite of the rules for the band: “After all hard work done already, let's get to the auction.” Most of O’Rielly's work focused on rules for the licensed part of the band. The general authorized access tier of the band is to open for business this month (see 1908210052).

“The 3.5 GHz band is prime spectrum for 5G services,” Pai said. “But when I became Chairman, we didn’t have the right rules in place to encourage the deployment of 5G in the band. … Thanks to Commissioner O’Rielly’s leadership, we put the rules in place last year that will facilitate the deployment of 5G in the 3.5 GHz band. And we are now ready to start the process that will lead to the 3.5 GHz auction commencing next June.”

“Mid-band spectrum is critical to deploying next-generation and 5G technologies, and I am pleased to see the FCC moving forward with the 3.5 GHz auction,” said Steve Berry, president of the Competitive Carriers Association: “CCA worked hard to ensure the band presents opportunities for our members to participate. Competitive carriers must have access to additional spectrum to enhance and expand their networks, especially in rural areas.”

With the U.S. “leading the world in 5G deployments, we’re thrilled to see Chairman Pai move forward with plans to free critical mid-band spectrum,” emailed Scott Bergmann, CTIA senior vice president-regulatory affairs: “This is an important milestone that will help maintain our leadership and we encourage the FCC to continue to move quickly on implementing the Chairman’s 5G Fast plan.”

Commissioners will vote on a final rule on access arbitrage that would update intercarrier compensation rules to shift the cost of inflated, high-volume telephone traffic to those that stimulate such calls and away from the long-distance carriers that pay for them now. The FCC issued an NPRM on the matter over a year ago in docket 18-155 (see 1811020044). The docket has remained active, with ex parte filings posted this week from HD Tandem, Sprint and Inteliquent. In general, competitive LECs from smaller, high-cost markets want to maintain existing compensation schemes, while larger telecom companies want relief from fees for forced indirect connections (see 1807230034).

The September agenda also contains a proposal on replacing a requirement that broadcasters advertise certain FCC applications in local newspapers with rules to allow for online notices, as expected (see 1909030057). The Further NPRM also seeks comments on simplifying the required announcements, and allowing for on-air notices that direct viewers and listeners to online information, Pai said: “This is just another example of how we are modernizing our media rules to reflect the digital age and streamlining them to eliminate unnecessary red tape.”

Also on the agenda is a draft order that would streamline direct broadcast satellite processing procedures the same way the agency streamlined its processing procedures for geostationary fixed satellite service. The agency in November adopted a DBS streamlining NPRM (see 1811130075). Some in the proceeding argued for using the DBS streamlining as an opportunity for opening the 12 GHz to other uses (see 1903270006).