WASHINGTON-Federal Communications Commission Chairman William Kennard, already under fire in Congress over telecom act implementation, merger reviews and agency reform, hit another hot button last week by asking a Senate appropriations subcommittee for authority to retrieve wireless licenses from bankrupt firms."We also need legislation...
WASHINGTON-The Clinton administration is reviewing potential candidates to succeed National Telecommunications and Information Administration head Larry Irving, who is expected to leave his post by year's end.One prospect, Greg Rohde, an aide to Senate Commerce Committee member Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), is endorsed by 15...
WASHINGTON-The Wireless Telecommunications Bureau of the Federal Communications Commission is in the midst of a shakeup that began with the appointment last month of Thomas Sugrue as chief and now appears headed toward a major overhaul resulting in a new management team and streamlined...
WASHINGTON-Those wishing to bring to market new and updated technologies, including access to the Information Superhighway, should look at the wireless industry to provide that access, said Kathryn Condello, vice president of industry operations for the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association.Condello was a panelist at...
WASHINGTON-An embarrassing dispute has erupted over Final Analysis' little low-earth-orbit satellite license, which has the National Telecommunications and Information Administration and Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) clashing with the Federal Communications Commission.Dingell, in a Nov. 18 letter to NTIA head Larry Irving, blasted the FCC's...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission on Friday named Thomas J. Sugrue chief of the FCC's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau effective Jan. 19.Sugrue replaces Daniel Phythyon, who was slated to leave the post on Dec. 1 for special project assignments within the FCC. As of the latter...
WASHINGTON-Daniel Phythyon, capping a stormy year-and-a-half stewardship of the Federal Communications Commission's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau, which had him under constant siege from feisty bankruptcy lawyers, angry lawmakers and high-powered lobbyists, said he will step down Dec. 1."The timing was my decision," said Phythyon. "The...
WASHINGTON-With the scheduled adjournment of the 105th Congress last Friday, the wireless industry will be able to point to few visible victories. Indeed, industry can point to just two victories-one early in the session and one as Congress was racing to get out of...
Nearly a year into office, Bill Kennard has defied all attempts to be pigeonholed as the newest chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He was general counsel and an understudy to former FCC chief Reed Hundt. Yet Kennard is not Hundt like. He's not...
WASHINGTON-Under even the most abnormal of normal circumstances, it usually is possible to handicap odds for passage of wireless legislation before Congress adjourns.But these are not normal times.An American president is under siege, and the global stage is imploding with financial meltdowns, political unrest,...
Qualcomm Inc. said it has clarified its stance with the European Telecommunications Standards Institute on intellectual property rights it claims to own for W-CDMA technology.In January, ETSI chose W-CDMA technology, based on a Global System for Mobile communications platform, as a third-generation technology choice...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission last week issued service rules for using spectrum by local and state public-safety agencies, which included doubling the amount of spectrum available to some agencies.However, some key cities, such as Los Angeles, will not benefit from the FCC's action because...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission is expected on Thursday to approve service rules for using the public- safety spectrum in the 746-806 MHz band. This spectrum currently is used for analog television channels 63, 64, 68 and 69, but is slated to be turned over...
WASHINGTON-The chairmen of the telecommunications oversight subcommittees in Congress late last week proposed legislation to eliminate two-thirds of the so-called "tax on talking" and place the remaining 1 percent in a fund to pay for Internet connections for schools, libraries and rural health-care centers.The...
WASHINGTON-The chairman of the House Commerce Committee last week charged the Department of State was unduly influenced by Comsat Corp. last spring when the State Department changed its views on legislation that was necessary to privatize two satellite organizations-Intelsat and Inmarsat.Rep. Thomas Bliley (R-Va.)...
In the end, all he could do from the far front corner of the spacious House Commerce Committee room he once ruled with an iron fist was sit silent, except for a few, hopeless entreaties for reason and fairness as Republicans prepared to cite...
Republicans, joyous over having launched Chinagate, are now writing the script for what they hope will be a best seller come 2000. We'll call it White House in the Unbalance for now.Al Gore, who scored political points as vice president embracing computers with personalities...
Boulder, Colo., is set to become a test bed for recently licensed Local Multipoint Distribution Services systems under the direction of the National Wireless Electronic Systems Testbed.N-WEST is a project of the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the Institute for Telecommunications Sciences,...
Here's something to ponder: Is the FBI to blame for the current CALEA fiasco, as the wireless industry has long claimed? Or does this rather serious controversy reflect the wireless industry's failure to negotiate a better deal when the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act...
WASHINGTON-Representatives of the Land Mobile Communications Council have begun informal contacts with the National Telecommunications & Information Administration, the agency that must approve any spectrum-sharing arrangement with the federal government, sources said last week.NTIA confirmed that a meeting was held last Thursday on spectrum...
WASHINGTON-The National Telecommunications & Information Administration estimates that the liberalization of the global telecommunications marketplace has resulted in a $675 billion opportunity for carriers that want to pursue business overseas.While the World Trade Organization treaty has paved part of the way into what used...
WASHINGTON-The Clinton administration, which now projects $30 billion from spectrum auctions during the next decade despite free-falling license prices, plans to seek legislation from Congress this year to sell 36 megahertz from TV channels 60-69 before 2002.Under last year's balanced budget agreement, the sale...
WASHINGTON-Industry participants in a Jan. 21 open forum to review the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau's rules and performance during the past two years agree that while the WTB has come a long way in coping with a new and diverse competitive scenario, it still has...
WASHINGTON-The Senate last week approved legislation to curb illegal cloning of wireless phones, setting the stage for passage next year of a bill that could stop hackers from stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from carriers each year."It's illegal to clone a wireless phone....
