The FCC should reject “self-serving” arguments by Sprint and T-Mobile asking it to rethink key parts of its May 15 spectrum holdings order (CD Aug 13 p1), Mobile Future Chairman Jonathan Spalter said in a blog post (http://bit.ly/1pmKT2x). Sprint and T-Mobile have had a different message for Wall Street and the FCC, he wrote. Spalter cited a T-Mobile news release (http://t-mo.co/1qFPGev) and a Sprint comment on the carrier’s spectrum position (http://bit.ly/1tP8cBv) saying the firm’s “spectrum position allows us to take a more aggressive stance in offering more data.” In “today’s more transparent world, you can’t have it both ways: Desperately seeking special spectrum handouts from government while simultaneously declaring spectrum superiority,” Spalter said. Sprint fired back. “Mr. Spalter’s latest blog is yet another attempt to perpetuate a virtual duopoly in the U.S. wireless market,” a spokesman said. AT&T and Verizon, “major supporters” of Mobile Future, “control the lion’s share of low-band spectrum and will go to great lengths to preserve their competitive advantage,” the spokesman said. Competitive carriers also need access to low-band spectrum, said Steve Berry, president of the Competitive Carriers Association: “It is not surprising that Mobile Future, an organization largely funded by AT&T and Verizon, is going to bat for the largest national carriers.”

Broadcom introduced a new development kit for its WICED family (for Wireless Internet Connectivity for Embedded Devices) family of components to enable developers to rapidly prototype “ideas and concepts” for Internet of Things devices and applications, the company said Wednesday. The $19.99 kit includes Broadcom’s newest Bluetooth Smart chip and five micro electro-mechanical systems and has a software stack that is Bluetooth 4.1 compatible, the company said. “By shortening the time between early ideas and end products, companies are able to deliver devices to market more quickly and with higher confidence in their success,” it said. Possible “use cases” range from a single-sensor technology to sophisticated programs gathering and analyzing data from multiple sensors, it said. It gave such smart home examples as using the kit to set up text alerts to be notified if a child’s bedroom rises above a certain temperature.

The Singapore-based Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) has added 14 members since January, the group said in a news release Wednesday (http://bit.ly/1C39rla). The new members are: Airi Ventures, Alcatel-Lucent, BAI, Broadcom, Charter Communications, DigiCert, Elitecore, Gemalto, Global Reach, Liberty Global, Linktel, Mobily, Telstra and Telus, WBA said. “They join at a pivotal time when Next Generation Hotspot (NGH) networks are now a commercial reality and operators are reaping the benefits of an improved carrier-grade of Wi-Fi,” the group said.

All five FCC commissioners got doused as part of the Ice Bucket Challenge issued by CTIA President Meredith Baker, a former commissioner (http://bit.ly/1C32gtm). The challenge is a fundraiser for efforts to fight Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), better known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. Chairman Tom Wheeler issued a challenge to all former FCC chairmen who haven’t taken part.

The fingerprint sensor market -- energized by the introduction of the iPhone 5s last year and by the Samsung Galaxy S 5 in the spring -- is expected to reach $14.35 billion in 2020, said a report from MarketsandMarkets (http://bit.ly/1qfw1Ro). Among the drivers fueling the fingerprint sensor market are increasing demand for simple, secure user access to mobile devices, mobile commerce and high adoption rates of smartphones, the company said Tuesday. Laptops own the highest share of fingerprint applications, but the segment will be surpassed by smartphones by 2020, with smartphone sensor sales expected to grow at a projected compounded annual rate of 56 percent from now until 2020, it said. Reductions in size of fingerprint sensors will enable integration in smartphones without sacrificing other functionality, it said.

T-Mobile added six new music streaming services to its Music Freedom program. AccuRadio, Black Planet, Grooveshark, Radio Paradise, Rdio and Songza are available for customers to stream on T-Mobile’s Data Strong network “without ever hitting their LTE data bucket,” T-Mobile said Wednesday in a news release (http://t-mo.co/VNV1o3). The Minority Media and Telecommunications Council supported the action, in an MMTC news release. Music Freedom “has made history by opening its national wireless platform to diverse-owned enterprises,” MMTC said, referring to the addition of Radio One-owned Black Planet. Earlier this week, the carrier expanded a data plan (CD Aug 27 p14).

The FCC Public Safety Bureau granted two waiver requests Tuesday for Anchorage’s application for authorities to operate an IP-based land mobile data system for public safety agencies and emergency responders on the general use channels on the portion of the 700 MHz band designated for public safety narrowband use. Anchorage intends to integrate the new system into the existing Anchorage Wide Area Radio Network (AWARN), the bureau said. One waiver will let Anchorage operate the mobile data system using 50-kHz channels, which is beyond the 25-kHz bandwidth the FCC typically allows under its rules. The other waiver will let Anchorage obtain from CalAmp Wireless Networks, the city’s equipment vendor for the project, equipment capable of operating with a channel bandwidth greater than 25 kHz, the FCC said. Anchorage’s waiver requests fit the FCC’s requirement that “unique or unusual factual circumstances” related to the system make it “inequitable, unduly burdensome or contrary to the public interest” to enforce the rule, the bureau said. There’s “little demand” for the 700 MHz general use channels in Alaska beyond the AWARN system, and Anchorage is justified in needing to use channel bandwidths greater than 25 kHz to achieve its desired data throughput rate of 128 kbps on the new system, the bureau said. All CalAmp transmitters for the new system must comply with industry-adopted adjacent channel power emission limits, which minimize interference to adjacent channels, the bureau said (http://bit.ly/VQVMMG).

The FCC World Radiocommunication Conference Advisory Committee (WAC) is nearing the end of its multiyear process and continues to make steady progress, WAC Chairman Scott Blake Harris, chairman of Harris Wiltshire, said during a meeting of the group Wednesday. “With the conference confirmed for November 2015, we're actually in the final stage of the work of our committee and if someone wants to say, ‘Thank God,’ that would be OK, too.” Harris said there has been acrimony as the group works through a few final positions. The WAC represents commercial interests as the administration prepares unified U.S. positions before next year’s WRC. WAC documents are at http://fcc.us/1qLdda4.

Twelve small wireless carriers, led by U.S. Cellular, urged the FCC to provide an additional 30 days for interested parties to file reply comments on the future of the Connect America Fund. If the FCC agrees, the new deadline would be Oct. 8. The Competitive Carriers Association earlier sought more time for replies (http://bit.ly/1vmwmWZ). “Over 1,000 pages of comments were filed by telecommunications providers, ISPs, electric cooperatives, equipment manufacturers, trade associations, industry groups, public utility commissions, and other filers” in the initial comment round, the carriers said in a filing in docket 01-92, posted by the FCC Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1tVdgTZ). Extra time is needed “to ensure that the extensive arguments and factual showings in the initial comments can be comprehensively addressed,” they said.

The FCC Enforcement Bureau imposed an $819,000 penalty on T-Mobile for violating commission rules on making the requisite number of hearing-aid compatible handsets available to its subscribers in 2009 and 2010 (http://bit.ly/1qL3Oj0). The bureau noted it first proposed the forfeiture in May 2012. “T-Mobile does not challenge the Commission’s factual findings or legal conclusion that it willfully and repeatedly violated Sections 20.19(c)(2) and 20.19(d)(2) of the Rules,” the bureau said. T-Mobile asked for a substantial reduction in the proposed penalty, but the bureau declined to reduce the amount the carrier must pay the government, the bureau noted. “Given the fundamental importance of providing consumers with hearing loss access to advanced telecommunications services, the severity of T-Mobile’s violations, and the company’s ability to pay, the proposed forfeiture of $819,000 is equitable.” T-Mobile is reviewing the order, a spokesman said. “We provide a broad selection of handsets that are hearing aid compatible and we take seriously our commitment to meeting the accessibility needs of our customers,” he emailed. “This action relates to issues that first were raised by the Commission several years ago, and we are now in full compliance."