SPECTRUM ROUND TABLE TOLD WIRELESS BROADBAND COULD PENETRATE VOICE MARKET

Panelists at a round table on unlicensed spectrum Tues. differed on the potential of such spectrum to displace both landline broadband and voice offerings, with one panelist foreseeing an erosion in the ILECs’ voice market. Sponsored by NTIA, the FCC and the State Dept., the all-day round table featured numerous policymakers, but they were in moderator roles and said the event was designed to elicit industry input. Interestingly, when one panel was asked by NTIA Dir. Nancy Victory to offer advice to the policymakers in the room, only one of 8 panelists called for more unlicensed spectrum.

Victory asked to what extent unlicensed wireless technologies could offer voice competitive with ILECs. J.P. Morgan Managing Dir.-Wireless Services Thomas Lee said voice addition to wireless broadband services would “continue to shrink the ILEC market… that’s sort of the dark side” of unlicensed services. But other panelists were skeptical that technologies such as Wi-Fi could offer the quality of service (QoS) and reliability found with a landline phone network. “I am skeptical in the extreme” that a wide-area unlicensed wireless network could supplant ILECs, said Theodore Schell, chmn. of Cometa Networks, which is building a wholesale network of Wi-Fi hot spots. Lee said QoS had proved less important to consumers offered free long distance on cellphones, saying younger consumers used to free Internet services would tolerate lower quality if free voice were packaged with a wireless broadband service.

Nortel Networks Chief Technology Officer-Wireless Networks Mark Whitton said reliability issues could be addressed in part “if someone had a backup of ubiquitous cellular networks,” saying that wireless phone carriers were beginning to make handsets interoperable with Wi-Fi hot spots. Still, Motorola Mgr.-Spectrum & Regulatory Policy Robert Kubik said such hot spots alone couldn’t offer voice, citing someone in a car: “There would be too much time doing handovers [from hot spot to hot spot].” He saw a better chance for Wi-Fi voice services in the enterprise market, saying Cisco already had entered the equipment market for that service.

Commerce Dept. Asst. Secy.-Technology Policy Bruce Mehlman said that for 2 years he had enjoyed a wireless LAN in his home but expressed interest in a wireless broadband service for the residential market that would compete with cable modem service and DSL, rather than extend those services as Wi-Fi often did. Prairie iNet CEO Neil Mulholland said his company already offered last-mile wireless broadband in 120 rural communities but said infrastructure was expensive. Whitton said standardized technology would help bring that cost down. Kubik agreed but said “we don’t know if we can wait until standardized equipment comes out… It’s gotta be done.” Schell said he was involved in an MMDS operation that struggled with line- of-sight issues and an inability to stream high-quality video. Those disadvantages don’t exist with new unlicensed services, he said, but issues such as tower placement will limit widespread deployment in many areas.

Asked by Victory for policy recommendations, only Mulholland called for more unlicensed spectrum. Whitton urged “rules on how to share spectrum… to allow for its most efficient use.” Schell took issue with the FCC for taking years to clarify its position on unlicensed spectrum, saying many companies went bankrupt during that time. Lee also said the capital markets wanted regulatory certainty.

Along with Victory and Mehlman, other govt. officials who participated in the round table were FCC Comrs. Jonathan Adelstein and Kathleen Abernathy; FCC Enforcement Bureau Deputy Chief Linda Blair, Wireless Bureau Chief John Muleta and Office of Engineering & Technology Chief Edmond Thomas; NTIA Senior adviser Jack Zinman and Asst. Dir. Michael Gallagher; and David Gross, State Dept. coordinator of international communications and information policy. All were in moderator roles, and the FCC officials were under sunshine rules on 2 wireless items on Thursday’s FCC agenda, a rulemaking on Part 15 on unlicensed spectrum and a report and order on the use of secondary markets to improve spectrum efficiency.