WCS, Satellite Radio Duel over 2.3 GHz Rules

The spectrum, at 2305 to 2360 MHz, has been the object of a decade-long fight over what protection WCS operators need from potentially harmful satellite repeater interference. FCC auctioned the WCS spectrum in 1997, but it has seen little buildout. The Satellite Digital Audio Radio Service, also auctioned in 1997, has millions of listeners. To reach listeners in urban canyons and other geographically difficult places, SDARS operators have built repeater networks under special temporary authority. The FCC has unsuccessfully prodded WCS and SDARS to come agree on a way to minimize interference.

Would-be broadband providers see the spectrum as ideally suited for WiMAX. The 2.3 GHz band is used in South Korea to offer WiBro. Both Sirius and WCA have proposed rules to the FCC. The members of the WCS Coalition are the Wireless Communications Association and Horizon Wi-Com, AT&T, NTELOS and NextWave Broadband, the companies that control nearly all the WCS spectrum.

“Sirius’ proposed rules are skewed heavily in favor of the SDARS licensees, and their adoption would sound the death knell for WCS as a vehicle for providing wireless broadband services to the American public,” the WCS Coalition said. “By contrast, the WCS Coalition’s positions reflect a good faith attempt to develop rules that should be reasonably acceptable to both services, but provide absolute interference protection to neither.”

In its comments, Sirius said it had warned WCS licensees that a mobile service might be “technologically infeasible,” but the WCS Coalition has chosen “to ignore this history.” If the FCC goes along with the WCS Coalition, satellite radio listeners would endure “crippling interference,” Sirius said. The company seeks to make rules on WCS C- and D-block licensees stricter and says the WCS band generally requires “less protection than originally proposed.”

The coalition conceded that its proposal isn’t perfect, but said it reflects out-of-band emission levels that WCS operators can live with. “Even if they are adopted verbatim, WCS will continue to be subject to interference from SDARS terrestrial repeaters,” the group said. “However, adoption of the WCS Coalition’s proposal will reduce these burdens to a tolerable level.” With a revamp, WCS operations won’t get started, the group warned, saying no “commercially viable filters” for consumer devices are available to deal with the out-of-band emission levels by satellite repeaters proposed by Sirius.

The WiMAX Forum endorsed the WCS operators’ calls for an overhaul, saying WCS licenses “face unreasonably restrictive out-of-band emission limits that cripple their ability to obtain equipment and deploy commercially viable services in the band.”

XM and Sirius want the FCC to grandfather the existing network. Not doing that “would create substantial network disruption and service continuity risk,” XM said. About 40 percent of Sirius’ terrestrial network operates at a power level that it says WCS licensees have found acceptable. The other repeaters “have been in operation for years and they are essential to providing quality service,” Sirius said.

If approved, the proposed merger of XM and Sirius could lead to uses for the resulting combined terrestrial repeater network other than simply overcoming land-based obstacles, the NAB charged in comments. The NAB didn’t comment on the main thrust of the proceeding -- setting how the 2.3 GHz band should operate -- but its comments display obvious worry about the terrestrial repeater network deployed by XM and Sirius. In a merger, XM and Sirius wouldn’t need to compete with each other, so they could use the combined terrestrial network “to offer locally-orientated programming, including local advertisements, which could cripple many local terrestrial broadcasters and hinder their ability to fulfill their obligation to service the public interest,” the NAB said.

XM and Sirius have admitted violating FCC rules on repeater placement in the past. The NAB doesn’t want the commission to forget this “record of misbehavior,” it said.

XM and Sirius shouldn’t be allowed to deploy a terrestrial repeater network in Alaska and Hawaii because its satellite signals do not reach outside the continental U.S. “Sirius is interested in using repeaters not to overcome interference caused by buildings, mountains and the like, but to overcome the effect of the curvature of the Earth and the antenna patterns of their satellites,” NAB said. With such a network, satellite radio would be in a position to compete with local broadcasters, which is opposed by broadcasters.