FCC to Explore Intelsat Warehousing Allegations

摘要

The FCC released a notice of inquiry recently that launches a proceeding into allegations that Intelsat LLC and other fixed-satellite service (FSS) providers are warehousing satellite orbital locations and frequency assignments and precluding competitors from buying capacity on their satellites. Comments on the NOI are due 30 days after Federal Register publication and replies are due 30 days after initial comments in IB docket 13-147. Several resellers of satellite capacity have raised concerns about the competitive state of the FSS market and alleged anti-competitive behavior by Intelsat and others since the 2006 Intelsat-PanAmSat Corp. merger. They also have complained that a lack of available orbital locations serve as an impediment to any competitor to Intelsat in the FSS market.