FCC to Vote on 3.45 GHz Auction, ORAN NOI March 17

FCC acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said 5G issues will be a focus at the March 17 commissioners’ meeting, circulating a draft order to start an auction of the 3.45-3.55 GHz band in early October (see 2102230046). She plans a notice of inquiry opening a “formal discussion” on open radio access networks, the FCC said Tuesday. Rosenworcel announced Monday commissioners will vote on rules for the $3.2 billion emergency broadband benefit program (see 2102220065).

The 3.45 GHz auction has been viewed as the spectrum item likely to get the first push under the new Democratic administration (see 2102190046). Rosenworcel has also been an ORAN advocate (see 2012080070). An aide to Democratic Commissioner Geoffrey Starks said Tuesday at a Wireless Infrastructure Association virtual conference (see 2102230067) that the FCC is looking at citizens broadband radio service rules among alternatives.

“We are taking significant action to help deliver the 5G you were promised,” Rosenworcel said Tuesday. “We will do that by considering an Order that will make much-needed mid-band spectrum in the 3.45-3.55 GHz band available for 5G, and a Public Notice that will seek comment on how we should auction this spectrum to ensure that it is put to use quickly …. Most importantly, we propose to get started quickly.”

Starks anticipated the high level of bidding in the C band, and that’s why he pushed for an FCC auction, said Chief of Staff William Davenport (see also his comments at [Ref 2102230067]). On 3.45 GHz, “we’re looking at different options,” he said, noting that both Democrats wanted questions in the Further NPRM on the auction asking about CBRS-style rules. “The staff is looking very closely at it,” he said: “We’re doing a lot of technical analyses and talking to DOD” and OMB.

Senate Armed Services Committee leaders at a Tuesday hearing didn’t push back against ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt’s endorsement of a DOD request for information on dynamic spectrum sharing of the 3.45-3.55 GHz band, which critics see as a form of 5G nationalization (see 2009210056). Schmidt said he “suggested a model” for DOD’s RFI in which the department “retains control of the spectrum but allows industry to share it in exchange for industry building the required infrastructure quickly, and at its own cost.” He believes that’s “not nationalized 5G,” as critics claimed. “This would be a privately built, operated, and maintained network that prioritizes” DOD use, Schmidt said. The Pentagon “should be applauded for examining innovative solutions to this urgent problem.”

Wilkinson Barker’s Bryan Tramont was “skeptical” of the C-band auction and surprised by the size of the bids, he said. More than $80 billion in bids is “an extraordinary number,” he told a Wireless Infrastructure Association conference where Davenport also spoke. “I’m very excited to see who won what,” Tramont said: “It underscores the hunger that the industry has for midband spectrum” and why the 3.45 GHz auction should proceed under similar rules.

Experimentation is important, but the CBRS auction was “complicated even in its final form,” Tramont said. “It took a long time to implement, and it didn’t raise the same kind of money,” he said. The FCC should clear bands where possible, he said.

“The short time-frame means the auction framework will need to be close to identical to one they have done before, with the C-Band the most relevant” comparison, New Street’s Jonathan Chaplin told investors: “Having the auction in October will leave even less time for C-Band auction participants to pay down debt between that auction’s conclusion and this one’s beginning, suggesting that whoever ‘won’ in the C-Band will be even less well positioned to ‘win’ in this auction.”

The ORAN NOI will “seek comment on the current status of Open RAN development and deployment, whether and how the FCC might foster its success, and how to support competitiveness and new entrant access to this emerging market,” the FCC said. “Open RAN has emerged as one promising path to drive 5G security and innovation in the United States,” Rosenworcel said. “With this inquiry, we will start to compile a record about how we can secure our vulnerable supply chains once and for all, and revitalize the nation’s 5G leadership and innovation.”

Members will vote on an order allowing the regulator to share communications outage information “with state and federal partners,” said the blog post. “This will go a long way to ensuring that downed networks are restored quickly and that emergency operations are not delayed.” Rosenworcel framed it as the FCC “taking steps to better prepare for emergencies like Winter Storm Uri.” The agency confirmed that the order stems from an NPRM approved 3-2 in March on information sharing in disasters. Both Democrats dissented (see 2002280069). That item proposed providing access to information in the network outage and disaster information reporting systems to state, territorial, tribal and federal agencies. It was blasted by then-Commissioner Rosenworcel as an insufficient, “modest gesture.”

Commissioners will also consider a rulemaking to update emergency alert delivery through phones, TV and radio in compliance with the Reliable Emergency Alert Distribution Improvement Act, which was enacted under the FY 2021 National Defense Authorization Act. Commissioners will also weigh in on an inquiry on whether emergency alerts can be delivered through other means of communications (see 2012040043).