The Transportation Department could make better use of its time and efforts encouraging LightSquared and the major GPS makers to resolve their disagreements on power levels and on steps GPS manufacturers could take to address overload, LightSquared said in an FCC filing posted Thursday in docket 12-340. It included comments LightSquared submitted earlier in the week with the DOT regarding the agency's draft test plan for studying interference between LightSquared's proposed wireless broadband network and GPS devices. LightSquared has been critical of that test plan (see 1510210022). In the latest DOT comments, it said DOT's proposed metric of 1 dB change in noise floor "is misguided because it fails to measure what the expert agency and Congressionally-designated spectrum regulator -- the Federal Communications Commission -- considers when it evaluates 'harmful interference': the ultimate impact of adjacent-band activity on the performance of the device." Arguments that ITU recommendations support such a benchmark are wrong because many recommendations "begin with user-measurable criteria and then derive interference levels," LightSquared said. Some recommendations referring to 1 dB noise floor relate to in-band interference, not adjacent band, and none of them applies the 1 dB specification for adjacent-band signal effects on GPS, it said. No one has shown a strong correlation between device performance and 1 dB desensitization, and even if such correlation existed, LightSquared's proposed testing would show it, it said. LightSquared also rejected GPS Innovation Alliance arguments that the DOT doesn't necessarily need detailed RF front-end information on the devices to be tested, saying it agreed with GPSIA that dwell time should be a component of testing, but it should be at least three minutes.

LightSquared is closer to emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy because its FCC International Bureau application for assignment of its licenses is among the items the FCC said is on circulation. In an ex parte filing dated Friday to be posted in docket 15-126, LightSquared said it and a representative of JPMorgan Chase met with representatives of Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Ajit Pai about its post-bankruptcy plans, including new ownership, and how that license reassignment would let it emerge from bankruptcy. Getting out of Chapter 11 "enables the Commission to strengthen the wireless market with no competitive harms by giving the reorganized company access to new financing that will enhance its ability to maintain existing services and (subject to any required approvals) to offer innovative new services that can help the country transition to next-generation 5G services," LightSquared said, saying it made a pitch for "prompt ... approval." JPMorgan earlier this month agreed to put its interest in post-bankruptcy LightSquared into a proxy, which could clear the path for the FCC to approve the license transfer needed before U.S. Bankruptcy Court approves its final emergence from Chapter 11 reorganization (see 1511090031).

Intelsat's Intelsat 29e, the first of its EpicNG high throughput satellites, is scheduled to launch Jan. 27, it said in a news release Tuesday. The launch will be from the Guiana Space Center in Kourou, French Guiana, aboard an Arianespace Ariane 5 rocket, it said. Intelsat 29e will be located at 310 degrees east, will replace Intelsat 1R and Intelsat 805, and provide broadband services to fixed and mobile network operators, aero and maritime mobility service providers, and to government customers, Intelsat said. The second EpicNG satellite, Intelsat 33e, is expected to go up in Q3, it said.

With so many people in the world seeking broadband access "for information, entertainment and commerce," very few are finding themselves “on the unserved side of the digital device,” EchoStar CEO Michael Dugan said on an earnings call. “We believe over the next 10 to 15 years many of them will require this capability,” Dugan said. “Wireless and fiber infrastructure should be an important part of this transition, so as a company,” EchoStar sees itself as “well-positioned with these technologies,” he said Friday. EchoStar’s “extensive video expertise” recently enabled Dish Network to introduce its Sling TV over-the-top service in the U.S., and “it would be natural for us to leverage this experience and technology platform in other areas of the world,” Dugan said. Monday, Dish, also chaired by Charlie Ergen, reported Q3 results and signaled in the minds of some analysts that it might not participate in the FCC incentive auction (see 1511090015).

Inmarsat subsidiary ISAT US wants to add an additional earth station terminal type for linking to its Global Xpress satellite network. In a license modification request filed Friday with the FCC International Bureau, ISAT said it wanted to modify its maritime license allowing operation of Ka-band blanket licensed terminals on maritime vessels to include its Cobham Sea Tel model Sailor 60 GX. The Sailor GX, like other earth terminals already covered by the maritime license, would communicate with the Inmarsat-5 F2 satellite, and would operate in the same frequencies of 19.7-20 GHz and 29.5-30 GHz, ISAT said. In its application, ISAT said it sought authority to use earth stations subject to its maritime license, as well as the new antenna terminal model, within the contiguous U.S. and U.S. territories, and on fixed and mobile offshore platforms.

LightSquared wants to open up the 1675-1680 MHz band used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for commercial wireless sharing. In a filing posted Thursday in FCC docket 12-340, the satellite company submitted an analysis it commissioned regarding NOAA's use of the band and results of a survey it conducted of end-users of NOAA data and services. LightSquared also said the FCC should issue a public notice seeking comment on the analysis, possible effects of commercial operations on non-NOAA users, and ways of addressing those effects -- all with the goal of an NPRM on the band in early 2016 regarding partial allocation of the spectrum for commercial use. That would help meet a goal in the Obama administration's 2010 memorandum pushing for the FCC and Commerce Department to jointly make 500 MHz of federal and nonfederal spectrum available for mobile and fixed wireless broadband, LightSquared said. The memo suggested a 10-year time frame. Commercial use of the spectrum would mean "lower wireless prices for consumers, more services by wireless companies and greater opportunities for innovation," LightSquared said, adding that any costs to NOAA users of getting data by alternative means "would be a small fraction of that amount." The analysis by Alion Science and Technology about the compatibility of commercial wireless with NOAA's use of the spectrum showed the two could coexist by relocating some NOAA radiosondes -- which contain atmospheric and temperature sensors and are attached to NOAA weather balloons -- and setting up protection and coordination zones, LightSquared said. The satellite company said it currently operates a network at 1670-1675 MHz, which it shares with NOAA sensor data links. LightSquared said it began talking this summer to users of NOAA data and products about potential effects. "Commercial LTE wireless operations in the 1,675-1,680 MHz band would have little or no impact on many non-NOAA users and ... reasonable alternative means exist for any users that might be impacted," LightSquared said. It said the FCC should seek input on a variety of issues, including what entities directly access NOAA data or services delivered via satellite that could feel effects of commercial transmissions over the spectrum, what other services could they employ for similar data or services, and how have they been affected by commercialization of nearby bands such as AWS-3. NOAA didn't comment.

Skynet Satellite seeks special temporary authority to do in-orbit testing of the Telstar 12V satellite. The testing is to start Dec. 1 and be done while the satellite drifts from its postlaunch location of 16 degrees west to 15.7 degrees west as it heads to its authorized slot at 15 degrees west, Skynet said in an FCC International Bureau request filed Wednesday. The testing can't be done at 15 degrees west because of risk of interfering with services carried on Telstar 12, Skynet said. Those services will be transferred to Telstar 12V after the in-orbit testing and the co-location of 12 and 12V at 15 degrees west, Skynet said. That traffic transfer is expected to be done by the end of Q1, at which time 12 will either be relocated or deorbited, Skynet said.

Intelsat and Sky Perfect JSAT agreed to jointly put up a satellite with C-band and high throughput Ku-band capacity to serve mobility and broadband connectivity demands in the Asia-Pacific region, Intelsat said in a news release Wednesday. Horizons 3e is expected to launch in the second half of 2018, operate at 169 degrees east and round out Intelsat's EpicNG global platform, Intelsat said. Horizons 3e would be the fourth satellite jointly owned by JSAT and Intelsat, following Horizons-1, Horizons-2 and Intelsat 15/JCSAT-85.

The satellite industry is in disagreement about what it says are allowable rise over thermal limits that could come with air-to-ground mobile broadband in the 14-14.5 GHz band. While Qualcomm has said such aeronautical service broadband could safely increase the rise over thermal -- the ratio between the total interference and thermal noise -- by as much as 1 percent, the safe figure that would protect fixed satellite service (FSS) uplinks is actually 0.33 percent, Intelsat and SES said in a joint FCC filing posted Tuesday in docket 13-114. The companies said the satellite industry previously indicated FSS interference from all noise sources should be capped at a 1 percent increase noise floor, going by ITU-Radiocommunication (ITU-R) recommendations, but those calculations didn't take into account additional secondary services in parts of the 14-14.5 GHz band -- tracking and data relay satellite service and federal fixed and mobile services. SpaceX in a joint letter in October with Qualcomm said it thinks Qualcomm's commitments would protect SpaceX's nongeostationary satellite system. But those calculations also failed to take into account those secondary users in the band, said Intelsat and SES. "That pact cannot change the laws of physics, the Table of Allocations or the ITU-R Recommendations." Thus any authorization of an air-to-ground mobile service in that band should follow ITU-R recommendations and give it no more than 0.33 percent rise in thermal noise, they said. Qualcomm didn't comment Wednesday. In a 2014 filing in the docket, the company said the transmit power levels already proposed by the FCC will ensure the AMS rise over thermal limits is less than 0.5 percent.

The Supreme Court shot down a pair of appeals by Dish Network and AT&T's DirecTV on how states tax their services versus how cable subscribers are taxed. The justices denied the direct-broadcast satellite (DBS) companies' petitions for certiorari Monday after meeting in conference Friday. The companies sued Tennessee Commissioner of Revenue Richard Roberts and the Massachusetts Department of Revenue over those states' tax structures: Tennessee in 2003 over its pay-TV sales tax regime, which gives cable subscribers a tax exemption on the first $15 of their bills but no such break to satellite-TV subscribers, and Massachusetts seven years later after the state enacted a satellite-only excise tax. The DBS companies filed writs of certiorari after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court sided with the state in an appeal and the Tennessee Supreme Court declined to review the case (see 1510220016).