The FirstNet board approved a $253 million budget for FY 2022 Wednesday. The budget allocates $79.3 million for operations, with the same amount in reserve. Another $94 million will be invested in network improvements. “FirstNet users now have access to AT&T’s 5G spectrum in a growing number of markets, and the new assets are helping to meet public safety’s increasing demand for deployables with nearly 1,000 requests … from January 2020 to date,” FirstNet said.

A single-round 2.5 GHz auction is “likely to be substantially more successful” than the standard simultaneous multiple round format, AT&T representatives told staff from the FCC Wireless Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics. AT&T warned of T-Mobile’s dominance in the band. “T-Mobile controls, through leases, the majority of incumbent 2.5 GHz licenses on a nationwide basis and has strong incentives to fill out that nationwide footprint with the overlay licenses” in the auction, said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 20-429. “The multiple rounds of an SMR auction would enable T-Mobile to discover which licenses have little or no competition and to win them at prices below its valuation, often at or near the reserve price.”

The FCC said Wednesday 42 companies filed short-form applications to bid in the 3.45 GHz auction, which starts Oct. 5. Sixteen applications were deemed incomplete. Among those now qualified are AT&T, T-Mobile and UScellular. Verizon has work to do on its application, which was found to be incomplete. Dish Network, which largely sat out the C-band auction, is in. Only 42 applicants applied to bid, down from 74 in the C-band auction. “It appears that Cable has not signed up to bid,” New Street’s Jonathan Chaplin wrote investors: “No other dark horses (such as a Big Tech player) immediately jump out either, suggesting the bulk of the competition for the spectrum will happen between carriers (as we would expect).”

Comcast's cybersecurity strategies include assessing how the company might be affected by major breaches like those against Colonial Pipeline and T-Mobile, said Chief Product and Information Security Officer Noopur Davis. She spoke Tuesday in Aspen, Colorado, at the Technology Policy Institute conference, where the previous day, the incident at T-Mobile was discussed and disclosed; see our reports here and here. "Immediately, yesterday, I had to step out of some of these sessions" at TPI when she heard of the data hacks against T-Mobile, Davis said: "My immediate, emotional response to seeing something like T-Mobile in the news is sympathy and empathy," and "it could happen to any of us." The reported incident spurred Comcast to look at "how did these threat actors get into T-Mobile" and are there "things that could impact us," Davis said. "Our surface is enormous" for possible attacks at Comcast, she added. "You have to start looking at that entire ecosystem." T-Mobile didn't comment on her remarks, saying it had no update on the incident. Davis also spoke to TPI about her company's cybersecurity strategy (see 2108170054).

The FCC Wireless Bureau granted nine 900 MHz broadband segment licenses Monday, all to PDV Spectrum Holding. The licenses cover markets in Illinois, Missouri and Iowa, including St. Louis.

Handsets with 5G functionality are expected to generate more than half of all smartphone industry revenue by 2025, rising to $337 billion from $108 billion in 2021, reported Juniper Research Monday. “Increasing the availability of lower-tier 5G smartphones is crucial to propagate 5G handset adoption in emerging markets,” it said. It’s pegging global Android smartphone pricing to be 65% lower than that of iOS by 2025, but “the enduring popularity of iOS devices in developed markets will make 40% of global 5G smartphone revenue attributable to North America and Europe.” It warned that right-to-repair legislation may impede 5G smartphone industry revenue growth “as more handset users choose to repair older models rather than upgrading.”

NTIA scheduled a virtual spectrum symposium Sept. 21, starting at 9 a.m. EDT, says Tuesday's Federal Register. The focus is “national spectrum policy development and the evolution of new techniques and technologies for federal spectrum management, including spectrum sharing.”

Aviation and aerospace industry representatives raised concerns on interference risks to low-range radar altimeters posed by mobile C-band use, in calls with aides to FCC commissioners. Industry “has been diligently examining the mitigations it or the FAA can initiate without the Commission or the 3.7 GHz Band flexible use licensees assuming an active role,” said filings posted Monday in docket 18-122. “Adding band pass filters to certified aircraft in a timely fashion -- before 3.7 GHz Band deployments start operating in major markets -- is a practical impossibility and fails to offer a comprehensive solution to mitigate the risks of interference to radio altimeters,” the filings said. The Aerospace Industries Association, the Aerospace Vehicle Systems Institute, the Airborne Public Safety Association, Airbus, American Airlines, the Air Line Pilots Association, Boeing, the General Aviation Manufacturers Association, Garmin International, Honeywell International, the International Air Transport Association and Lockheed Martin were among those represented on the calls to aides to acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and Commissioners Geoffrey Starks and Nathan Simington.

Concerns remain on Verizon’s proposed buy of Tracfone, New America’s Open Technology Institute told an aide to acting FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. Other groups dropped opposition at the FCC last week (see 2108120029). The FCC “must, at a minimum, impose strong conditions to protect low-income consumers from price increases and ensure TracFone remains a supportive Lifeline participant,” OTIS said in a filing posted Monday in docket 21-112: “These conditions should include rigorous, independent enforcement mechanisms, including an ombudsman or compliance officer who is empowered to proactively monitor compliance with any merger conditions.”

An AT&T representative urged the FCC to consider 6 GHz interference concerns raised by Southern Co. (see 2106240075), in a call with an aide to acting FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. The FCC allowed the use of low-power indoor devices without automated frequency coordination based on “theoretical studies by some proponents for unlicensed use that purported to show that such use would be unlikely to cause harmful interference to microwave incumbents,” said a filing posted Monday in docket 18-295. Southern provided “data from real-world tests of commercial, off-the-shelf 6 GHz unlicensed devices and an actual operating microwave link, and the data show harmful interference to primary, incumbent microwave licensees is inevitable,” AT&T said.