LNP Called Example of Good Regulation of Powell’s FCC

“The work of the Spectrum Policy Task Force stands out as an especially important accomplishment,” FCC Chief of Staff Bryan Tramont said. “Truth-in-billing will be important in a long term,” Tramont said, noting that he thought a national approach to billing better than state- by-state. “State regulation is a significant threat,” he said. Muleta said the 800 MHz order was “one of the biggest accomplishments” at the FCC. “I think we did the right thing,” he said. FCC Comr. Copps’ Wireless Adviser Paul Margie said Powell should be “commended” for moving forward on spectrum and public safety issues.

Intercarrier compensation and universal service drew mention by several FCC officials as “things undone.” “I wish we have done more on… intercarrier compensation and universal service,” Muleta said. He said the universal service system “doesn’t make sense… The [money] recipients have to be individuals.” Muleta said the FCC should deal with that issues “relatively quickly, so we can move on and get services out to people.” Tramont agreed but said “a lot of the wireless success stories” were driven by the Commission’s not acting.

U. of Colo. Adjunct Prof. Dale Hatfield said the wireless industry could resolve universal service and intercarrier compensation issues, but “it’s politics that won’t let us do what we could do. I believe people can sit down and figure this out… It seems to be more a political problem than a theory of what to do.” Asked about the bill & keep approach, Sam Feder, aide to FCC Comr. Martin, said: “We are reviewing that as an option… We have to ensure sustainability of the [universal service] fund and that’s very important to us.” FCC Policy Development Chief Robert Pepper said: “You have to be careful about what you mean by bill and keep. A part of that is where is the edge, where do you interconnect? It depends.” Pepper said all should contribute to the “national goal of affordable service. Nobody disputes the goal, but the ways we used to do that should and are changing.”

Margie voiced concern about how the FCC approached wireless carrier mergers. “We never produced merger guidelines and never even gave signals about how mergers can be done,” he said, “and we are going to regret that.”

Margie also fretted that the Commission hadn’t “established a regulatory regime” for spectrum interference. “We've got old rules for new spectrum applications and the ideas of harmful interference are broadcast ideas, really… We don’t really know where in those situations we can draw the line, but we should have more of a standard, we should have an idea of permissible interference.” But NNTIA Deputy Dir. John Kneuer said “trying to predetermine those things is going down an extraordinarily dangerous way.” He said Margie was raising an “important point that we need to have a common understanding of the way we talk about things. But if government starts to define what is harmful interference, that would present a threat to new technologies.” He said that task should be left to engineers. Margie responded: “But saying that it’s a danger to define interference is exactly what we do now.” Kneuer interrupted: “On a case- by-case basis.”

FCC Comr. Adelstein’s aide Barry Ohlson said the Commission often caught flak for laggardliness. “We can’t afford to make bad decisions because that could have a really dramatic effect… And making decisions takes time and consideration.” Muleta said fast technology growth was something that “is straining our internal thinking process.” He said FCC decisions should promote innovation: “If we regulate too much, we are going to stop innovation.” Muleta said the FCC should promote intermodal competition: “You got to get to that at some point.”

Pepper said competition won’t vanish due to wireless industry consolidation. “We are going to continue to see a dynamic market and some of it is going to have intermodal competition and some of it is going to be intramodal,” he said. Asked whether creating 3 wireless carriers affiliated with wireline incumbents would affect competition, Pepper said: “I don’t really know yet how it is all going to play out, but there is a number of scenarios” that could create competition.

Pepper said wireless was speedily becoming a practical substitute for wireline. He said the percentage of consumers who “cut the cord” was “very modest.” But he said: “I think about substitution not only [based] on the number of lines but minutes of use and in that way there’s been a dramatic substitution.” He said there was a “dramatic increase in wireline minutes reduction,” and “mobile revenue increased dramatically,” while “long distance revenue went down.”

Motorola Dir.-Regulatory Affairs Mary Brooner said with wireless substitution growing, “one thing that could help” was the FCC clarifying spectrum issues. “Spectrum is available but a lot of conditions around it are not clear. We need to know that as substitution increases, spectrum is available for it.” T-Mobile Vp-Govt. Affairs Thomas Sugrue asked if panelists thought broader use of unlicensed spectrum could help. Hatfield said: “Use of unlicensed spectrum is a tough sell… I am optimistic about unlicensed in rural areas and pessimistic in urban areas.” - Susan Polyakova

CTIA Convention Notebook…

MyWireless.org announced its launch. “Wireless regulations are eating up” savings from wireless technologies “and threatening to reduce consumers’ wireless choices,” said MyWireless.org Exec. Dir. Kimberly Kuo: “Wireless is hyper-competitive and responsive to consumers… It’s time consumers made their voices heard to protect their wireless rights.” The new consumer group said it planned to reach wireless users via a website that will post information on wireless issues at the state and national level. Users will be able to use the site to reach politicians, it said.