Wireless

摘要

T-Mobile’s proposed “dynamic market rule” for limiting bidding in the incentive auction of broadcastnTV spectrum won’t work and should not be adopted by the FCC, AT&T said in a report filed at thenagency Wednesday (http://bit.ly/19tFy27). AT&T Vice President Joan Marsh explained the carrier’s objectionnin a blog post (http://bit.ly/1d7U2ni). “The purported advantage of low band spectrum — that it allowsnmore coverage and better building penetration with fewer cell sites — has been overtaken by marketplacenrealities under which capacity not coverage drives network deployment,” Marsh said. “Carriers deployingnlow band and high band spectrum alike must squeeze as many cell sites as they can into their networks tonmeet exploding demand for data services.” Marsh also argued that “to the extent this is less the case in ruralnareas, those areas are not spectrum-constrained and the lower cost of building out low band spectrum in suchnareas is offset by the higher cost of the spectrum itself.” T-Mobile fired back. “Without adequate competitivensafeguards, there is nothing to stop the largest two carriers from walking away with all the 600 MHznlow-band spectrum,” said Vice President Kathleen Ham, in an email. “Such an outcome would be bad fornconsumers and bad for competition in the wireless broadband marketplace. The two dominant carriers alreadyncontrol nearly 80 percent of low-band spectrum. Reasonable spectrum concentration limits at auction,ncombined with sound auction-design features such as the Dynamic Market Rule, will promote competition,nencourage innovation and increase consumer choice, without harming auction revenue.”