AirPower, Apple’s teased multi-device wireless charging mat, has been scrapped, said multiple reports Friday. TechCrunch Editor-in-Chief Matthew Panzarino tweeted a statement attributed to Dan Riccio, Apple senior vice president-hardware: “After much effort, we’ve concluded AirPower will not achieve our high standards and we have cancelled the project. We apologize to those customers who were looking forward to this launch. We continue to believe that the future is wireless and are committed to push the wireless experience forward.” The charging mat, first shown at the September 2017 iPhone 8 launch, had reached cult status as a product the company promised but didn't introduce as expected in spring 2018. As recently as Monday, Apple customers on Twitter were clamoring for the product amid Apple’s software launch of its news, video, gaming and credit card services. When Apple previewed AirPower 18 months ago (see 1709120054), Phil Schiller, senior vice president-worldwide marketing, said Apple believed it could make the wireless charging experience “even better” and “move the entire industry forward.” He said Apple hoped people would love it, “that it encourages others to create more advanced solutions based on technology like this.” Apple had planned to "incorporate these benefits into the future of the standards to make wireless charging better for everyone,” he said. The next month, the company bought a New Zealand-based wireless charging company, PowerbyProxi (see 1710250043). Apple didn’t comment Friday.

The FCC Office of Engineering and Technology sought comment on a Massachusetts Institute of Technology waiver request for its WiTrack System, a swept-frequency ultrawide band indoor medical monitoring device. It uses up to 2.5 GHz in the 6 to 8.5 GHz band “to passively monitor mobility, breathing, and other physiological signals,” without requiring body-worn sensors, OET said. MIT needs a waiver because the device doesn’t comply with a requirement that a Part 15 UWB transmitter use a bandwidth wider than 500 MHz. “MIT states that its WiTrack System would not satisfy this definition because each frequency step is less than 500 MHz in bandwidth ‘at any point in time’ even though the total bandwidth needed for optimal performance exceeds 500 MHz, regardless of the fractional bandwidth,” said Friday's public notice. Comments are due April 18, replies May 3, in docket 19-89. The notice sets the initial comment date as April 18, 2018.

Best Buy tapped the tax refund opportunity in an iPhone promotion Thursday. “Turn your refund into a reward,” said a customer email, pitching a $400 Best Buy gift card to customers who trade in select phones for an iPhone XR. Payment plans were $31.25 over 24 months at Verizon or a one-time $749 payment; $25 a month over 30 months, or $31.25, with Next Every Year at AT&T; and $31.25 over 24 months at Sprint, or as low as $15 per month over two years with a new line.

The FCC Office of Engineering and Technology sought comment Thursday on a waiver request by Rohde & Schwarz USA for a security scanning system that uses the 70-80 GHz band. The QPS 201 Personnel Security Scanner system is designed “to detect the presence of concealed metallic and non-metallic threats that may be carried in or underneath the clothing of persons entering locations where the device has been deployed,” OET said: The company claims the QPS 201 “will serve a valuable national security function that cannot be comparably replicated by currently available equipment.” Rohde & Schwarz needs a waiver because all frequencies above 38.6 GHz are classified as “restricted,” except for a few bands where the FCC permits unlicensed operation, OET said. The company also wants to operate at high emissions levels than are permitted by the rules, OET said. Comments are due April 29, replies May 14 in docket 19-88.

CTIA representatives highlighted the group’s spectrum goals, in a series of meetings at the FCC, said a filing posted Thursday in numerous dockets including 18-122. “CTIA highlighted how smart spectrum policies can unlock the enormous promise of 5G and spur U.S. global technological leadership, and urged the Commission to act quickly to make additional spectrum -- especially in the mid-band range -- available for terrestrial wireless use,” CTIA said. The group met with Chief Donald Stockdale and others at the Wireless Bureau, and aides to Commissioners Mike O’Rielly, Jessica Rosenworcel and Geoffrey Starks.

The National Wireless Safety Alliance got its start four years ago, the outgrowth of 2013 industry summit focused on tower worker safety, Executive Director Duane MacEntee said during an FCC podcast released Thursday. “We had a lot of fatalities and it garnered a lot of, in my opinion, proper attention by authorities,” he said. “The fatality rate was very high. At one point, we were labeled as the most dangerous industry in the U.S. You don't want to be No. 1 in that regard.” The summit “was really the first time that collectively everybody got together representing multiple sectors of the industry to speak openly and honestly about what is needed in terms of changing that dynamic,” he said. The group offers a nationally recognized certification program for tower workers to ensure they are appropriately trained, MacEntee said. The podcast is hosted by Evan Swarztrauber, aide to Commissioner Brendan Carr.

Smart home solutions will increasingly rely on voice control, video and data analytics, sound recognition and artificial intelligence to simplify user experience, blogged Parks Associates Wednesday. U.S. broadband households own more than 10 connected devices, and as they buy more, they’re basing purchase decisions on a product’s ability to work with others they own, said Parks. But interoperability remains “a leading challenge," said analyst Chris O’Dell. Three-quarters of consumers who intend to buy a smart home device in the next year said the ability to work well with others is key to the purchase decision, but that's increasingly difficult when consumers buy stand-alone devices "at different times, from different brands, rather than purchasing smart home systems." Some 30 percent of computing and entertainment device owners report experiencing loss of wireless connectivity, naming routers as the most common source of the problems. Mesh networks and 5G could mitigate wireless issues, O'Dell said.

ARRL, which represents amateur radio operators, asked the FCC for a pause in docket 16-239, which proposes to remove limitations on the symbol, or baud, rate, applicable to data emissions in some amateur bands. The FCC sought comment in July 2016. ARRL asked for a pause “for the purpose of facilitating discussion among commenters of differences expressed in the record of this proceeding.” ARRL said, “We intend our effort to reach a common understanding of issues and to agree on proposals insofar as possible.” The filing was posted Thursday.

C Spire slammed T-Mobile for failing to address complaints about its lack of backhaul in rural markets as it pushes forward on a buy of Sprint, in an FCC filing posted Thursday in docket 18-197. “The only concrete information” T-Mobile has offered in response “pertains to the percentage of T-Mobile’s existing rural sites that have high speed backhaul ‘today,’” C Spire said: “This misses the point, perhaps intentionally. T- Mobile has a long record of providing inadequate coverage in rural America, instead having focused its buildout in and around major metropolitan areas.” T-Mobile responded March 11 that it has substantial high-speed backhaul capabilities for its rural facilities, and has concrete plans in place to further increase bandwidth to meet the performance requirements of the New T- Mobile network." Many details were redacted. Also Thursday, T-Mobile said it cut the ribbon at the Seattle Mariners’ stadium, which is now T-Mobile Park after the carrier bought the naming rights. T-Mobile filed at the FCC a blog by CEO John Legere. “How happy are you with your wireless service today?” Legere asks. “How about your cable or satellite service? Has it been getting better and cheaper lately? If you live in a rural community, do you feel like you have real choices for both mobile and broadband services? What about if you need support -- how is the customer service you get?”

Excitement about mobile photography innovations is “good news for the smartphone industry,” struggling to surpass “stagnant sales forecasts,” IHS analyst Wayne Lam said. Huawei Tuesday became the first vendor to incorporate a folded optics design that enables lossless optical zoom photography in a smartphone. Lam said Huawei and Samsung are investing heavily in mobile photography improvements, while Apple has “arguably been left behind in the current design cycle.” Other “radical” mobile photography designs are coming to market, including one from Nokia’s (HMD)/Light.co with a five-lens, selectable depth-of-focus camera. “Ultimately, competition breeds better products,” and the next wave to mobile photography, including time-of-flight and other “novel” optical sensors, “should give the industry confidence that smartphone innovations have longer legs than the naysayers have proclaimed,” said the analyst. As for Huawei's future in the U.S. market, Lam said the company's success in Europe "helps limit the immediate impact of pressures the company faces from the United States government. Short term, there doesn't appear to be a solution" to the situation in the U.S., he said, and Huawei will continue to focus on existing businesses.