LeoSat's seeming shutdown should be seen as a minor setback for the small-satellite market, since the company was targeting a specific niche of high-throughput connectivity for corporate customers and that carried a particularly high price tag and a longer time for return on investment, Frost & Sullivan analyst Arun Sampathkumar blogged Thursday. The market likely can support many thousands of smallsats, and mega constellation operators with cheaper business models will find investors, he said. LeoSat's U.S. market access was revoked in September (see 1911140004). It didn't comment Friday.

The 1 dB increase in noise floor is the international definition of harmful interference and can be an objective and predictable metric for protecting satellite-based radio navigation like GPS from harmful interference, GPS Innovation Alliance Executive Director David Grossman blogged Thursday. He said critics press for other metrics, like use of key performance indicators (KPI), but those are calculated further downstream in the receiver when harmful interference may already have occurred. Evaluating KPIs across legions of devices, operational scenarios and measurements "is logistically and administratively impossible," he said.

SpaceX representatives urged approval of its pending modification for new orbital planes for 1,584 planned broadband satellites (see 1909030043), in a meeting with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioners Geoffrey Starks, Mike O'Rielly and Brendan Carr, per an International Bureau posting Wednesday. It said if the FCC does update its orbital debris rules, they must apply equally to U.S. operators and non-U.S. ones authorized to provide domestic service, or operators will seek other licensing administrations to avoid U.S. rules. The company said Amazon's pending Kuiper constellation application (see 1904040034) should be part of a new processing round. It said the FCC shouldn't allow mobile use of MVDDS spectrum until a coordination strategy is viable.

Iridium's sole remaining first-generation satellite, SV097, is scheduled to begin de-orbiting Thursday, the company said Monday. It said it will host a live webcast showing the beginning of that de-orbit, and discussion on de-orbiting. It will begin de-orbiting after a second-generation Next satellite's in place to replace it (see 1907110001).

The FCC Wireline Bureau named Hughes Network Systems an eligible telecom carrier for New York. It's conditioned upon and limited to authorization to receive Connect America Fund support in coordination with the state's New NY Broadband Program, said Wednesday's order in docket 10-90.

Other non-geostationary orbit operators continue to have problems with Amazon's proposed Kuiper mega constellation, with numerous reply comments filed this week arguing it needs to be part of a new NGSO Ka-band processing round. OneWeb said FCC rules mandate that the Kuiper application should trigger a new processing round. It also said Kuiper's request to share spectrum on an equal basis with first-round licensees and applicants should be denied to protect the NGSO interference environment and existing investments. Giving Kuiper the same status as other qualified applicants that were part of the 2016 processing round "would eviscerate the processing round framework and violate ... clear Commission policies," SES/O3b said. SpaceX said Amazon arguments it won't preclude future entrants since two applicants from the first round won't operate "defies common sense" since Amazon plans magnitudes more satellites than the original applicants. Iridium said Kuiper hasn't shown why it shouldn't need a waiver for its plan to use feeder links in the 19.4-19.6 GHz, 29.1-29.25 GHz, and 29.25-29.5 GHz bands or to operate in the 19.7-20.2 GHz and 29.5-30.0 GHz bands. Urging denial of the Kuiper application, Theia said if the agency approves it, it also should extend the milestones for already-authorized Ka-band systems to give those operators time to address the disruption Kuiper's entry would bring. Telesat dismissed Amazon arguments its directional antennas justify waiving the processing round rules, saying use of those antennas is irrelevant. Amazon argued a processing round waiver wouldn't eliminate its spectrum sharing obligations (see 1911140004).

Using a 1 dB noise floor power limit on bands adjacent to GPS bands, as DOD urges (see 1911210055), would have a cascading deleterious effect on numerous services, not just Ligado's planned terrestrial service, the company said in FCC docket 11-109 Monday. It said manufacturers measured and reported the 1 dB yardstick inconsistently and its use would be arbitrary and unworkable. Citing a Roberson and Associates analysis, it said services in the wireless medical telemetry service, aeronautical mobile telemetry, Iridium Certus, L-band mobile satellite service and AWS-3 uplink bands operate at much higher power levels than 1 dB would allow. The GPS industry urges 1 dB (see 1807100046).

The satellite industry was able to "contain the persistent encroachments" on spectrum allocated to satellite as well as get more flexibility and new allocations at the 2019 World Radiocommunication Conference, said the Global Satellite Coalition, which includes the Satellite Industry Association. GSC said the WRC-19 action on earth stations in motion (ESIM) in the Ka band "unmistakably answers the need for more flexibility in the use of existing spectrum allocations to address increased demand for connectivity." The protection of C-band downlinks in Asia and Africa ensures protection of services there, it said. Setting up a regulatory framework for non-geostationary satellites to operate in the Q and V bands, the allocation of 1 GHz of spectrum for fixed satellite service in the 51.4-52.4 GHz band for feeder links, and allocation of spectrum for high altitude platform stations and international mobile telecom also were key, the consortium said. It said agenda items for 2023 including ESIM communicating with geostationary satellite networks in Ku band and NGSO satellite systems in Ka band, and technical considerations for space-to-space links were good news. It said SIA member AT&T didn't support all GSC's views. WRC-19 wrapped up Friday (see 1911220014).

Satellite operators are pushing their plans for how an FCC C-band auction (see 1911220066) should work. Eutelsat CEO Rodolphe Belmer, in meetings with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, Commissioners Brendan Carr and Geoffrey Starks and an aide to Commissioner Mike O'Rielly, said it backed Pai's call for a C-band public auction, per a docket 18-122 posting Friday. Eutelsat said reallocation incentives "should be efficient, fair, transparent and competitively neutral" for C-band satellites authorized to provide services and their earth station customers. It said the agency should give primary responsibility to the C-band satellite operators to manage and complete the transition of their earth station customers' services, and they can best work with them to do that transition in a timely fashion using voluntary, market-based arrangements. It said a transition monitor could manage payments to satellite operators. The company said incentive payments to C-band satellite operators with capacity to serve the continental U.S. should include a fixed, upfront incentive payment to cover voluntarily relinquishing authorizations and undertaking obligations to manage the transition process while ensuring continuity of earth station customers. There should be reimbursement of actual and reasonable satellite operator costs in transitioning earth station customers to other bands or alternatives, and a final payment for achieving FCC-defined transition requirements, plus deductions or penalties for not meeting timelines. It's working on a refined proposal with a total incentive amount, to be paid from auction proceeds. ABS Global, Claro and Hispasat said Thursday the FCC could add a terrestrial use component to satellite authorizations but make clear those flexible use rights would have to collectively assigned by some deadline through auction. It could also require satellite operators to allow the FCC to do the auction on their behalf, avoiding the litigation risk that comes with letting a small group of satellite operators sell spectrum in a band where more hold similar rights. ABS and the others said earth station operators should get incentive payments so they can "invest in connectivity solutions that facilitate bridging the digital divide." ABS et al. proposed a satellite operator compensation formula that incudes computing each operator's share of the total amount of capital "impaired by a repurposing" and each operator's share of the total amount of spectrum use rights relinquished.

CTA said another competitor in broadband delivery can speed up innovation and cut consumer costs, in an FCC International Bureau letter posted Wednesday. It urged the agency expeditiously approve Amazon's proposed Kuiper Ka-band constellation (see 1907050015).