FCC “holding firm” on December 5G auction
April 14, 2020
By Chris Forrester
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) says it is “holding firm” on its plans to auction 280 MHz of C-band spectrum over the US in “mid-December”.
The comment emerged in a letter sent by FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly to President Donald Trump on April 8th.
Commissioner O’Rielly praised the president for his support the drive to free up spectrum for a speedier 5G adoption in the US “and eventually 6G services”. The letter reminded President Trump that the FCC has taken “aggressive” action to address the mid-band spectrum in the 3.5 GHz band and also the satellite operator’s 3.7 GHz C-band (and the FCC is also exploring freeing up of 75 MHz of frequencies within the 4.9 GHz band).
However, O’Rielly says that these planned steps are “simply not enough”. He talks about US carriers needing an additional 350 megahertz of spectrum over the next few years, and asks the president to talk to the Department if Defense to give up some bandwidth.