After the embarrassing $1 license sales in the Wireless Communication Service auction two years
ago and the C-block personal communications services bankruptcies, some began to question whether spectrum still
had value.
Others suggest the real question is whether spectrum management-which seems to have been abandoned
in the Age of Auctions-still has value.
Subsequent auctions and WNP’s cool $355 million profit in the NextLink
deal are persuasive evidence that, yes, radio spectrum still is worth something.
Is spectrum
management?
Depends on who you ask. Free marketeers have no use for spectrum management, since it implies
government regulation. For them, spectrum is a commodity no different than pork bellies or light sweet crude.
But
could manufacturers ever really live in a world of spectrum futures?
Then, there are those who believe that-
regardless of what licensing tool is in vogue-spectrum management is worthwhile. Perhaps more than anyone else in
recent years, FCC member Susan Ness has contributed the most in this policy area.
That Ness might not be around
for a second term (her current term expires June 30) has major implications for spectrum management or lack thereof in
the future.
Ness organized a spectrum management hearing in March 1996 and plans to do it again this spring. She
believes that while the present system of allocating spectrum for particular services, writing technical and service rules
and then auctioning licenses has worked fairly well, technological advances and increased spectrum demands are
“challenging the bounds of our spectrum management process.”
Indeed, controversy swirls around 2
GHz relocation costs for new entrants, like ICO Global Communications, and around a spectrum policy that imposes
auctions on nearly everyone except global satellite applicants. But as Ness and others point out, the costs and
uncertainty associated with global satellite auctions here, there and everywhere likely would have kept Iridium and
others in the future from ever launching.
On the other hand, should not U.S. mobilsats pay something to the U.S.
government in exchange for spectrum? What about public-safety and other private wireless spectrum? Congress
exempted public safety from auctions, but have federal regulators planned adequately for future
requirements?
Lawmakers extended auction authority to private wireless frequencies, but does that make it good
public policy? Are spectrum lease fees the way to go? Will private wireless’ future spectrum needs be met or will
federal regulators continue to delude themselves with the idea commercial carriers can adequately accommodate
companies’ specialized internal communications?
There are many other spectrum policy issues that could use some
thoughtful guidance.
Fact of the matter is that Ness isn’t going away anytime soon, regardless of her renomination
fate. Maybe she has some answers.
