Stephenson Has Deep Concerns About Administration’s Spectrum Sharing Push
AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson was sharply critical of the Obama administration’s move to embrace spectrum sharing as the only way of making spectrum now in federal hands available for wireless broadband in the near future. Stephenson, who spoke at the Brookings Institution Tuesday, told reporters later he has deep reservations about spectrum sharing, with its many unknowns. Stephenson also warned that an upcoming incentive auction of broadcast TV spectrum is not a “silver bullet” that will solve the industry’s expected spectrum crunch.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
"If we make policy decisions before the industry, the technology or anything is prepared to take advantage of it, then you create a bigger problem than you have today,” Stephenson said. “The technology is not ready to utilize this. So if you come out and say ‘let’s share spectrum,’ but there’s not a means for spectrum sharing, you're compounding the problem.” Stephenson told us he has had no discussions with members of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, the high-profile group which approved a report in May urging that sharing effectively become administration policy for federal spectrum (CD May 29 p1).
Stephenson also said many unknowns remain about a broadcast TV auction, a key part of spectrum legislation enacted in February. “We have got to go identify a lot of broadcasters who are willing to sell their spectrum through this approach and this process that’s been defined,” he said. “You've got to find enough of them that provides a meaningful footprint of spectrum that makes it valuable to any of us that want to come and bid on it. Once you've identified that, you've got to put the auction process in place. We're talking years to accomplish just where I've gotten to now.”
The auction is also unlikely to yield enough spectrum to start to address demand, Stephenson warned. “It’s 50 MHz of spectrum that’s been identified to be auctioned off to six, seven different competitors. … We're going through 10 MHz every 10 months right now.” The TV spectrum is also unlikely to be ready for carriers to use for six to eight years “if you can find willing sellers,” he said. But he said he applauded Congress and the FCC for pushing through an incentive auction authorization. “We have got to keep pushing this as fast and as hard as we can,” he said. “We've just got to keep bringing new spectrum to market. But that is not a silver bullet. … That’s got its own issues.”
Stephenson had some warm words for the FCC, saying he saw signs that the commission is starting to move more quickly in some key areas. “I think they've done an admirable job over the last couple of months,” he said. Approval of AT&T’s buy of 700 MHz licenses from Qualcomm in late 2011 took a little more than a year, he noted. “We had a number of deals last year that sat for some as long as 17, 18 months,” he said. “Since the beginning of the year the pace has really accelerated. That’s good.”
Predictability from regulators is critical, Stephenson said, citing Verizon Wireless’s proposed buy of AWS licenses from SpectrumCo and Cox. “Were all watching the Verizon deals very closely,” he said. “We think that will provide a good indication in terms of what the FCC’s position is on spectrum aggregation and how much spectrum can be owned and so forth."
AT&T needs certainty on spectrum aggregation limits as well, Stephenson said. “If there is going to be some kind of spectrum screen or spectrum cap, I'm an advocate of ’then tell us what it is,'” he said. “Let’s have a public proceeding. Let’s have a full disclosure. Let’s have an open public process. And let’s set that cap so that the industry knows what it is and the industry can go out and begin to execute, do what we can do.” The wireless industry “is a little bit stuck right now because we really don’t know what the rules and the expectations of the regulatory arena are,” he said.
Michael Calabrese, director of the Wireless Future Program at the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute, issued a statement after Stephenson spoke stressing the importance of spectrum sharing. Calabrese is also a member of the Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee, which is examining sharing (CD May 31 p1). “While AT&T’s focus is on re-purposing spectrum for exclusive use by wireless providers, there is a very limited supply of prime spectrum that can be quickly re-sold or cleared for auction,’ Calabrese said. “The nation needs an additional policy push to open unused and lightly used spectrum for shared use on a more expedited basis. For example, the military and other federal agencies control by far the largest amount of unused spectrum capacity. Although these federal systems cannot quickly or easily move off of the spectrum, technology today permits shared use with the private sector. In fact, this is already happening on a limited basis, but could be expanded to substantially increase the amount of spectrum available for wireless communications while also spurring new technological innovation.”