Could be. They might ought to buy some spectrum, as it is not a sure thing that they are going to get to keep what they currently have. ARTT had another fair day Friday. The following article was interesting. My apologies if it has been posted previously. Ali,about to forget, but didn't TGNT collect the 100 mil a good while ago from Nippon for their stake in TGNT?
Wireless-Broadband Companies Protest Spectrum Policy
By FRED DAWSON
A growing gap between the capabilities of wireless-broadband technology and the technical assumptions underlying Federal Communications Commission spectrum policy is wreaking havoc with the efforts of service providers and their vendors to forge viable business plans.
"The commission is acting on policies that were based on technology as it stood seven or eight years ago, which makes it very difficult to make sense out of LMDS [local multipoint distribution service]," said David Ackerman, executive vice president of WinStar Communications Inc.
WinStar operates wireless services at 38 gigahertz, and it has amassed spectrum blocks averaging close to 500 megahertz in 160 markets nationwide. The FCC has scheduled auctions for LMDS to begin Feb. 18.
"Why should we bid for a 1,150-MHz block of spectrum when the commission says it's going to put 1,400 MHz on the market at 38 GHz later next year?" Ackerman asked.
Other parties trying to put together wireless-broadband strategies are asking the same question.
"If you're not one of the lucky ones who got spectrum for nothing, getting into this is like jumping off a cliff," said an executive at a major long-distance company, asking not to be named. "How can you gauge what LMDS spectrum is worth when you have no idea of what the other spectrum options are going to be or when they're going to be made available?"
At the outset of the LMDS proceedings, the technical limitations were such that one-way video was seen as a stretch for any point-to-multipoint applications at frequencies as high as the 28-GHz block assigned to LMDS. But today, the ability to deliver any type of fixed service in two-way mode at frequencies well above 40 GHz has greatly changed the way that the wireless-broadband community views market opportunities.
"From a radio guy's perspective, it's all radio, with some differences in propagation characteristics as you go up the [frequency] scale," said Steve Warwick, chief technical officer of WebCel Communications Inc., a likely participant in the delayed LMDS auctions. "But the regulatory process forces us into developing different architectures that fit different licensing categories."
The FCC's policies are making it hard for Wall Street to make sense of LMDS or of anything else associated with support for wireless-broadband networks.
"The FCC should just wipe the slate completely clean and get away from this balkanized approach to licensing," said Michael Elling, a senior analyst for Prudential Securities, who follows the multifarious wireless sectors.
Where LMDS is concerned, the commission has designated 493 basic trading areas for single licenses of 1.15 GHz, along with a second, 150-MHz license, creating an "all-or-nothing" situation with respect to ownership, Elling noted.
He said this makes it very difficult for any company to create the national footprint that would justify commitment of resources to wireless broadband as the key point of entry into local markets.
"The prospects would be a lot more appealing if there were multiple national licenses of 400 MHz or 500 MHz each," Elling added.
Such licenses need not be limited to the spectrum region set aside for LMDS. But while the FCC has indicated that it is looking into future allocations from 40 GHz all the way to 56 GHz, officials have indicated that these tiers are "low-priority" at this point.
Such thinking is creating artificial distinctions in technical standards and in how wireless broadband is regulated from one country to the next. In fact, the main issue affecting the use of wireless-broadband technology is the limitation on economies of scale imposed by inconsistent government policies here and abroad, said Jonathan Drake-Wilkes, business development manager for U.K.-based wireless-equipment supplier GEC Marconi Ltd.
"This piecemeal approach [to spectrum allocation] makes it harder to find large sections for new system applications," Drake-Wilkes said. When it comes to making use of spectrum anywhere from the low-20-GHz to mid-40-GHz range, "there are no significant technical problems left to resolve," he said.
In Europe, where 40.5 GHz to 42.5 GHz has been designated for "multipoint video distribution systems," equipment is available, trials are under way and, in one instance, commercial services have begun that mirror the commercial LMDS operation that CellularVision USA Inc. has under way at 28 GHz in New York. The first commercial use of MVDS spectrum for point-to-multipoint services anywhere has begun near Zurich, Switzerland, in a deployment for delivery of television services by Swisscom (formerly Swiss Telecom).
"We're looking at using MVDS for one-way video and, eventually, two-way services in a number of areas, including uncabled territories around Geneva," said Panchard Jean- Pascal, the project engineer overseeing the rollout in Sion, near Zuirch. "This is a very conservative company, but the performance has been so impressive that the decision to move forward was made very quickly."
The MVDS technology, supplied by Philips Broadband Networks Inc., a technical ally of CellularVision, delivers frequency-modulated TV signals over cells measuring about 5 kilometers across, Jean-Pascal said. In a trial lasting nine months, in weather conditions that included heavy snow and rainfall, Swisscom registered outstanding performance with no complaints from the 50 test households, he said.
"It's too soon to say how far the company will go with this technology or how it will affect our fiber and coaxial deployment plans," Jean-Pascal added. "But it certainly has gotten the attention of our senior management."
Such realities are giving pause to many entities as they look at the potential costs of going after LMDS spectrum versus waiting for more to come available.
Teleport Communications Group, for example, which owns 38-GHz operator BizTel Corp. and which was expected by some insiders to be a bidder in LMDS, doesn't intend to get involved in that auction, said a company executive, who requested anonymity.
"There are other options for us, and we're looking at all of them," he noted. |
