Page 89 - SAMENA Trends - February 2020

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FCC Approves $9.7 Billion Package to Speed C-Band Clearing

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission on Feb. 28 voted the $9.7 billion in payments to encourage satellite operators to
to auction a large portion of C-band in December under a plan that fully vacate the spectrum two years faster — in 2023 instead of
includes $9.7 billion in incentives to expedite relocating satellite 2025 — was appropriate, or legal. “Without a strong incentive for
operators out of the spectrum to make way for high-speed 5G satellite operators to cooperate, it will take years longer to clear
networks. The agency’s five commissioners voted three to two in this spectrum, dramatically reducing the value of this spectrum
favor of the plan, released three weeks ago, despite worries that the opportunity to wireless bidders,” FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said here.
plan will trigger litigation from disaffected companies or a rebuke “It’s like repainting your house before you sell it; yes, there are
from Congress where lawmakers had sought to legislatively costs to doing that, but the costs are more than offset by the
prescribe the auction rules. Central to the debate was whether higher sales price.” The FCC expects mobile network operators,
like Verizon and T-Mobile, and other bidders to pay for satellite
operator relocation costs and for the accelerated spectrum
clearing. Those costs would be included in what bidders pay to
access the spectrum when the FCC auctions it off in December,
and are in addition to an estimated $3 billion to $5 billion or more
of relocation costs — new satellites, ground stations, signal filters
and signal compression technology — the FCC also expects them
to cover. The FCC said Intelsat, SES, Eutelsat, Telesat and Embratel
Star One, all of which demonstrated they have C-band customers
in the U.S., as eligible for the accelerated clearing payments,
which they would receive if they meet FCC clearing milestones
that would free 280 megahertz of C-band by December 2023. Pai
said he believes the FCC’s “conservative approach” will benefit the
U.S. treasury, which would keep the rest of the auction’s projected
$30 billion to $77 billion in total proceeds.

MIT Technology Review Names LEO Constellations among Breakthrough

Tech

Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite constellations were named among
10 Breakthrough Technologies for 2020 by MIT Technology
Review in its March/April print issue. Other technologies
named include Artificial Intelligence (AI) -designed molecules,
hyper-personalized medicine, and quantum supremacy. In the
explanation, Journalist Neel V. Patel highlighted reusable launch
architecture and cheaper manufacturing as driving down the cost
of launch, and the potential of LEO constellations to connect the
world with internet access. Yet he also mentioned astronomers’
concerns about interference, and the prospect of collisions in
space. “[SpaceX‘s] Starlink’s near-miss with a [European Space
Agency] ESA weather satellite in September was a jolting reminder
that the world is woefully unprepared to manage this much orbital
traffic. What happens with these mega-constellations this decade
will define the future of orbital space,” Patel wrote.

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