T time

These are tenuous times for T-Mobile USA.
Having spent $4.2 billion for 120 licenses in last year’s advanced wireless services auction and seeing its German sister company ready to live with the iPhone, you can understand why T-Mobile USA might be getting a little antsy about federal agencies’ continued use of a portion of spectrum it bought rights to use and desperately needs if it is to compete in the 3G market.
The relocation process is subject to an arrangement whereby the government will use $1.1 billion from the $13.7 billion total in AWS auction proceeds to fund the transfer of government wireless operations from the 1710-1755 MHz band to other frequencies under varied timelines that stretch up to six years.
As such, it is unclear whether the federal government is actually behind in relocation efforts, or simply moving too slow to suit T-Mobile USA and others.
“Bidders participated knowing they didn’t have full details about the government’s ongoing use of the spectrum. Therefore, the companies could have chosen not to participate,” aid John Kneuer, head of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration and the Bush administration’s point man for AWS relocation.
At the same time, he said NTIA is evaluating whether AWS licensees and federal agencies can share certain frequencies without causing interference to each other.
Democratic and Republican leaders of the House Commerce Committee voiced concerns about possible government relocation intransigence in late June, directing Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez to provide them with a series of progress reports. In the first update on July 13, Gutierrez told lawmakers the migration of 1700 MHz federal systems to other frequencies was going well generally. However, Gutierrez flagged as a potentially serious problem the relocation of mobile surveillance devices “used for critical law enforcement and homeland security missions.” Ah, the mother of all trump cards.
T-Mobile USA reportedly offered to pony up $50 million to nudge federal agencies off 1700 MHz frequencies as part of an interim relocation solution. Another, possibly cheaper idea might be to promise defense and homeland security personnel a truckload of iPhones and a year’s worth of free service if they depart the airwaves promptly. Sure, T-Mobile USA does not have domestic rights to the iPhone, but a little software jiggering could fix that. The reward? The carrier would gain access to the spectrum and whet the federal government’s appetite for iPhones serviced by the No. 4 mobile-phone operator. What a coup it would be!