The Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART) disagreed sharply with FCC arguments and groups supporting FirstNet that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit shouldn’t stay parts of the FCC’s October order on the 4.9 GHz band. BART, the National Sheriffs' Association and the California State Sheriffs' Association sought a stay, which was opposed by the commission, the Public Safety Spectrum Alliance and Public Safety Broadband Technology Association (see 2503030053).
Supporters of the FCC’s July order reducing call rates for people in prison while establishing interim rate caps for video calls (see 2407180039) said Friday they’re cautiously optimistic that the agency won’t make significant rules changes. Chairman Brendan Carr expressed some concerns in July and concurred with only parts of the incarcerated people’s communication services (IPCS) order, but he also said most of his objections were already addressed. The order implements the Martha Wright-Reed Act of 2022.
T-Mobile’s SpaceX-enabled text messaging service, T-Mobile Starlink, is just the start of space-based communications the carrier plans to offer, CFO Peter Osvaldik said late Wednesday at a Morgan Stanley financial conference. Much of the discussion was about satellite communications and fiber, demonstrating T-Mobile’s evolving business plan.
The FCC on Thursday released drafts of the three items that Chairman Brendan Carr teed up for a vote at the commission’s March 27 open meeting. The GPS notice of inquiry asks about a wide range of possible alternatives to GPS for positioning, navigation and timing (PNT), including terrestrial-based and space-based solutions. The FCC also released drafts of two 911 items (see 2503050062).
AT&T CEO John Stankey is optimistic that the FCC under new Chairman Brendan Carr will make more spectrum available for full-power, licensed use, though the business leader sounded a note of caution about the round of tariffs that President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday.
With Congress fighting over whether DOD spectrum will be reallocated for commercial use (see 2502270064), experts agreed Wednesday that putting a value on federal spectrum remains difficult.
The FCC will focus on making GPS and 911 calls more reliable at its March 27 open meeting, Chairman Brendan Carr announced Wednesday. The meeting will be the second with Carr at the helm. Draft meeting items are expected to be posted Thursday.
The satellite industry hopes for a better reception from President Donald Trump's administration than it got under former President Joe Biden concerning satellite broadband as a part of the BEAD program (see 2412130011), Boston Consulting Group’s Mike French said Wednesday. His comments came as Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick promised a “rigorous review” of the BEAD program (see 2503050067).
The antitrust policies of President Donald Trump's second administration continue to take shape, though it's expected that the FTC and DOJ will be less aggressive in rejecting mergers compared with Joe Biden's administration, experts said Tuesday during an Information Technology and Innovation Foundation webinar.
The move to open radio access networks (ORAN) is happening, but it will require continuing focus on interoperability and scale, O-RAN Alliance Chair Abdurazak Mudesir said Tuesday at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. “If we’re not able to scale the commercial deployment,” ORAN won’t “be worth the effort,” said Mudesir, group chief technology officer at Deutsche Telekom. The alliance held a separate event as part of MWC.