The Land Mobile Communications Council asked the FCC Friday to clarify that it doesn’t plan to start accepting T-band applications, beyond those from incumbent licensees, after a suspension public notice (see 2106210025) expires Dec. 19. LMCC also asked the FCC to renew the notice through June 30. A requirement to identify TV stations that applicants must protect “has presented significant obstacles to the orderly resumption of T-Band application and licensing processes contemplated in the Suspension Modification PN,” the council said it emailed two agency staffers, noting some are “ghost” stations that no longer exist. Some incumbents haven't filed applications because of the notice, the group said: The notice “has required others to modify their system parameters to less than optimal configurations that they plan to adjust when and if the protected television station list is corrected.”

Lead times in Broadcom’s supply chain “remain extended,” though “stable,” and inventory in its channels “remains very lean,” said CEO Hock Tan on an investor call Thursday for fiscal Q4 ended Oct. 31. Broadcom’s semiconductor solutions revenue grew 17% year on year to $5.6 billion, he said. The stock closed 8.3% higher Friday at $631.68.

The FCC precision agriculture task force was rechartered for another term Thursday, said a public notice. The group plans its first meeting virtually Jan. 13 at 10 a.m. EST. Land O'Lakes Chief Technology Officer Teddy Bekele was redesignated as chair. Michael Adelaine, South Dakota State University vice president-technology and safety, was designated as vice chair. The task force will include four working groups: mapping and analyzing connectivity on agricultural lands, examining current and future connectivity demand for precision agriculture, encouraging adoption of precision agriculture and availability of high-quality jobs connected farms, and accelerating broadband deployment on unserved agricultural lands.

The FCC Wireless Bureau OK'd a waiver for Cross Telephone, making the company eligible for tribal land bidding credits for licenses it bought in the citizens broadband radio service auction for four licenses covering the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. “Based on the facts of this case and evidence that this specific Tribal land is underserved, we find that waiver relief is warranted,” said a Thursday order. The bureau noted the Osage Nation supported the request.

Public safety agencies are likely to have much broader use of smart algorithms and other evolving technologies, many relying on 5G and better networks, said Mehmet Ulema, business professor at Manhattan College. “The current use … is just the tip of the iceberg,” the academic told an IEEE webinar Wednesday. Telecom systems are “massive,” with multiple vendors involved in building networks, said Susan Ronning, principal at Adcomm Engineering: “It’s not just a radio system. It’s not just a network.” Communication inside 911 call centers is “difficult,” with dispatchers talking to callers and first responders while also talking to each other, she said. New technologies are “great,” but operators have complicated jobs and new systems must be maintained, she said. “It’s not necessarily simple when you get too many technologies involved,” she said. “It’s great to have all these technologies, but there has to be a support team” and “it’s very difficult to find people to do this kind of work,” Ronning said. Growing complexity of emergencies in urban settings will require more use of technologies that let first responders collaborate, said Dean Skidmore, IoT+LTE Consulting Group principal consultant. Land-mobile radio, 5G and push-to-talk technologies are deployed and have to work together, he said. Sharing sensitive data across jurisdictions and agencies is difficult in urban areas, he said. Size, weight, ruggedness and battery life are important factors for devices used by first responders, said Narendra Mangra, consultant at GlobeNet. Devices have to be easy to use “to be able to get information very quickly,” he said. Coverage, capacity and service performance of networks are important to public safety, as is interoperability, he said.

The federal government is increasingly rife with spectrum fiefdoms among agencies, contrary to the FCC's core purpose as a centralized point of spectrum policy decision-making, Commissioner Brendan Carr said Wednesday during the Practicing Law Institute's annual telecom policy and regulation seminar. He said updating memorandums of understanding would help, but ultimately there must be deference to the expert agency making a final decision. Such "devolution" of spectrum policy will be a permanent fixture, but that trend needs some reversing, he said.

Energous won its first regulatory approval in Asia for RF-based power transfer at any distance. The OK in India for Energous’ 1W WattUp PowerBridge transmitter “opens new market opportunities for over-the-air power solutions” and follows similar approvals in Europe and the U.S., the company said Tuesday. Applications for the wireless charging technology include smart buildings, industrial IoT sensors and retail electronic displays, Energous said.

Airbnb may be violating U.S. sanctions by listing more than a dozen homes for rent on land owned by a sanctioned paramilitary Chinese entity, said Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla. In a Dec. 7 letter to the company, Rubio said Airbnb is “complicit in enriching an organization facilitating horrific human rights abuse” and called on Airbnb to delist the rentals. Airbnb lists homes for rent on land owned by Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, which was sanctioned by the Treasury Department in 2020 for helping to create a surveillance and detention program for Muslim minority groups (see 2111300031 and 2007310028). Although the company said it operates a sanctions compliance program and doesn’t believe it’s violating sanctions, Rubio said he doesn’t understand how transactions related to the rentals are legal. “How a paramilitary organization complicit in heinous human rights abuses could pass such a screen is beyond comprehension,” Rubio said. “By continuing to allow these listings, Airbnb is implicitly endorsing and encouraging travel to Xinjiang, a region host to an ongoing genocide.” An Airbnb spokesperson and Treasury spokesperson declined to comment.

Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with the top stories for Nov. 29 - Dec. 3 in case you missed them. You can find any article by searching the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.

The FAA warned about flights being diverted or grounded because of 5G C-band wireless broadband signals. Satellite and network experts told us the regulatory clash between the FAA and FCC over 5G in the C band reflects in part the lack of a permanent head of NTIA to broker an agreement.