NextWave told the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, White Plains, N.Y., it had reached a proposed settlement agreement with Sprint Spectrum on a disagreement on payments the bankrupt carrier owed to defray the costs of relocating certain microwave licensees from PCS spectrum. Last fall, Verizon Wireless, Sprint and T-Mobile pursued separate claims against NextWave on allegations of outstanding relocation costs. Sprint told the court in Aug. that NextWave owed it $4.87 million to compensate for part of the costs of relocating certain microwave incumbents. The FCC adopted rules in 1996 on relocation of fixed microwave licensees that had to be cleared to make way for new PCS licensees. The agency required that new licensees pay for the cost of moving microwave incumbents to other frequencies, mandating that all PCS companies that benefited from spectrum clearance by other PCS licensees still had to chip in for relocation costs. Earlier this month, Sprint PCS filed a brief at the court, increasing the amount of its claim to $6.44 million to reflect invoices it had submitted to NextWave for additional cost-sharing reimbursement obligations not covered in earlier filings. Under the new agreement submitted to the court for approval Tues., Sprint PCS would be allowed an administrative claim of $3.2 million to be paid in cash when NextWave’s reorganization plan took effect. NextWave debtors would assign to Sprint all their interest in reimbursement rights for which they were entitled to receive payment under FCC rules for specific links. NextWave and Sprint would agree to release each other from claims related to any microwave relocation obligations associated with build-out activities that occurred before the reorganization plan took effect. A hearing on the motion on the compromise agreement is set for Feb. 4 before Bankruptcy Judge Adlai Hardin. In a separate claim, T-Mobile USA had argued that NextWave owed it $4.1 million for relocation of microwave incumbents related to PCS spectrum clearing. T-Mobile has sought administrative claim status before the bankruptcy court and immediate payment of funds. A hearing is set before Hardin on that matter Jan. 24. NextWave this week submitted a filing to the court in opposition to T-Mobile’s request. NextWave said T-Mobile’s invoices for payment showed that the “vast majority of the relocations” were done before NextWave had filed for Chapter 11 and were a requirement of T-Mobile’s expanding its own operations. NextWave said it opposed T-Mobile’s requests because: (1) It hadn’t complied with the FCC’s cost-sharing rules it was asking the court to enforce against NextWave. “FCC orders and rules establish that payments are not owed until a company begins commercial operations, which debtor [NextWave] has not yet done.” (2) The cost recovery, even if T-Mobile were entitled to some reimbursement, shouldn’t be done under administrative priority under federal bankruptcy law.
Ultra-wideband (UWB) semiconductor company Alereon secured $31.5 million in its first round of Series A financing. The company, which had been part of Time Domain, said it would use the proceeds to complete development of its UWB chipset solution, bring its product to market and obtain initial revenue. Alereon said the round of funding was led by Austin Ventures, with some financing contributed by Pharos Capital, Centennial Ventures, eCentury Capital, Duchossois Technology Partners and PTV Sciences. Alereon said its first product would connect TVs, PCs, camcorders, digital cameras, printers, DVDs and MP3 players to one another “at hundreds of megabits per second using very little power.” Alereon said its chipset would function as a wireless USB or IEEE 1394 connection.
Although it’s still focused heavily on consumer electronics gadgets, the annual Consumer Electronics Show is expanding rapidly to include govt. officials, the telecom and satellite industries and the Internet. The convention is Jan. 8-11 in Las Vegas (www.cesweb.org).
With an IEEE standards process on ultra-wideband (UWB) still at an impasse, a coalition that includes Intel and Texas Instruments (TI) plans to present new test data next month that addresses interference concerns, sources said. Meanwhile, camps divided between Intel, TI and other technologies and a side led by Motorola said they were moving forward on their own specification while the standards process remained bogged down. “We feel like it’s not reasonable to be constrained unduly by a process that is being kept in place politically,” said Stephen Wood, Intel strategic mktg. director for UWB.
Democratic Presidential candidates know President Bush will be a tough challenge in Nov., but some believe there is one issue on which he is vulnerable -- media ownership. Former Vt. Gov. Howard Dean (D) and other candidates have hammered the Administration on that issue. Aside from that, broadcast and media issues aren’t getting much play in the campaigns although campaign finance and broadcast indecency are likely to gain some attention.
Jon Cody promoted to FCC Chmn. Powell’s aide for media and broadband issues… US Signal advanced Lisa Gemmen to vp- engineering and Tim Hall to vp-operations… George Pelletier, Waitt Radio, named chmn. of Radio Ad Bureau Small Market Advisory Committee… RadarSat promoted John Hornsby to pres., succeeding Phil Gray, moving to parent MacDonald Dettwiler… Jack Matthews, ex-Premium Movie Partnership, named exec. vp-COO, Jupiter Programming… William Owen, ex- Cruttenden Partners, appointed CFO, Outdoor Channel, replacing Richard Dickson, resigned… MobilePro CEO Arne Dunhem resigns to pursue new CLEC opportunity… Brian Hurst, ex-National Semiconductor, named Anadigics vp-worldwide sales & mktg.
The Commerce Dept. said information technology (IT) was helping lead a revitalizing economy, but the lagging telecom sector continued to trail. In releasing its “Digital Economy 2003” report Tues., Undersecy. of Technology Philip Bond said growth in the macro-economic sector was driven by IT spending. He said the report showed “promising signs for the tech sector.” Undersecy. of Economic Affairs Kathleen Cooper said that after “two tough years, we are seeing signs of renewed strength.” Of the 2.9% of “real U.S. economic growth” predicted for 2003, IT-producing industries were expected to contribute 0.8 percentage points, said the report, based on data through the 3rd quarter. IT industries are expected to supply 8% of gross domestic product (GDP), the report said, and the growth rate of the IT sector is estimated at 6.4%. Performance varied by IT sector, and the struggling telecom sector continued to lag. While IT service industries and computer and semiconductor manufacturers were rebounding from their moderate pace in the early 2000s, communications and other telecom equipment manufacturers were continuing to fight for sales, the report said. IT unemployment continued to remain a problem. Since 2000, the sector has lost 11.2% of its jobs, compared with 2% of the overall economy. IT job loss, originally concentrated in manufacturing and low-skill positions, has spread to almost all levels. One growing problem -- IT outsourcing to other countries -- isn’t tracked in the report. Cooper said Commerce was working on developing better statistics on outsourcing and probably would work more closely with the Labor Dept. to determine how it was affecting the IT economy.
SAN JOSE -- Emission restrictions on Ultra Wideband (UWB) devices probably will be relaxed eventually, but not quickly or easily, an FCC official said Thurs. Policy & Rules Div. Chief Alan Scrime of the Engineering & Technology Office told a Bluetooth Americas conference chip-makers here: “The [UWB] bite’s going to be bigger, and we'd like to make it [limits] higher.”
EchoStar will use Broadcom chips in its new set-top boxes (STBs), Broadcom said. Both STBs -- Dish 322 and Dish Player-DVR 522 -- will allow users to purchase one box for independent control of more than one TV, the company said.
Spectrum experts called on federal policy-makers Wed. to make more unlicensed spectrum available at lower frequencies and warned that the U.S. was falling behind other parts of the world in embracing new wireless technologies. “That giant sucking sound that you hear is the entire Internet moving to Asia,” futurist George Gilder said at a conference sponsored by Public Knowledge and the New America Foundation.