The Effect of Comcast's 600MHz Spectrum on T-Mobile's Low Band 5G - NR Channel Size Thu, Sep 14, 2023

In Fierce Wireless' article on T-Mobile's initial lease of Comcast's 600MHz spectrum, there were 3 markets highlighted as "required" as part of the purchase agreement.  These three markets are New York City, Orlando, and Kansas City.  In this post we want to examine the effect on the effective Band 71 NR channel size that T-Mobile will be utilizing for their low band 5G network in these markets.

To see all of the markets where Comcast has 600MHz spectrum, we will utilize our Web Spectrum Viewer - Mapping.

Comcast 600MHz Licenses:

A simple way to view the current and the new channel size is to view T-Mobile and Comcast's 600MHz licenses in our Web Spectrum Viewer - Spectrum Grid.

New York PEA Market Licenses:

In the New York market, T-Mobile currently controls 2x15MHz of spectrum enabling a 15MHz uplink and downlink channel.  With the addition of Comcast's adjacent A block spectrum T-Mobile will be able to increase their channel size in the 600MHz band to 20MHz.

Kansas City PEA Market Licenses:

In the Kansas City market, T-Mobile currently controls 2x15MHz of spectrum enabling a 15MHz uplink and downlink channel.  With Comcast's E block spectrum T-Mobile will be able to increase their channel size in the 600MHz band to 20MHz.

Orlando PEA Market Licenses:

In the Orlando market, T-Mobile currently controls 2x10MHz of spectrum enabling a 10MHz uplink and downlink channel.  With Comcast's E block spectrum T-Mobile will be able to increase their channel size in the 600MHz band to 15MHz. 

How Much Has T-Mobile's EBS License Ownership Changed since the FCC Rule Change? Fri, Jul 14, 2023

 On July 11, 2019, the FCC released a report and order that provided a pathway to commercial ownership of the 2.5GHz Educational Broadcast Service (EBS) channels that were previously reserved for educational groups.  In this post, I am going to examine the progress that T-Mobile has made in shifting from leasing this spectrum to owning it.

We will be looking at two trends, using historical data from Spektrum Metric's Mobile Carrier - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool.  The Mobile Carrier - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool is updated monthly and provides historical analysis going back to 2014.

Looking at our Spectrum Ownership Grid in the Web Spectrum Viewer, T-Mobile's control of the EBS spectrum is clearly seen.  This is our Spectrum Grid displaying "Future" data which includes spectrum that T-Mobile leases or has a pending transaction filed.

Spectrum Grid - Future:

Shifting to the Spectrum Ownership Grid to display the spectrum licensee "FCC" reveals the licenses that T-Mobile actually owns.  All of the white cells are educational licenses that likely lease their spectrum to T-Mobile.

Spectrum Grid - FCC:

National Weighted Spectrum Depth Trend:

The spectrum available in the EBS and BRS (Broadband Radio Service) bands for each county totals 194 MHz.  If T-Mobile controlled every license in every county their National Population Weighted Average spectrum depth in the 2.5 GHz band would be 194 MHz, thus any amount of below 194 MHz represents another licensees ownership or lease of spectrum in these bands.

After the EBS Auction was completed, T-Mobile's total 2.5 GHz spectrum (orange line) rose from roughly 164 MHz to 180 MHz, indicating that about 14 MHz of Nationally Weighted Spectrum is controlled by other carriers and licensees.  The spike in September 2022 indicates the release of the auction results.

Over the same time period we quantified the spectrum that was directly owned by T-mobile (blue line).  Note:  The EBS Auction results are not reflected in this trend line because T-Mobile has not received direct ownership of the licenses.  In the December 2010 to June 2023 timeframe, T-Mobile increased their ownership of the EBS spectrum by 11 MHz (National Weighted Population Spectrum Depth).

New EBS Whitespace Auction Licenses Tue, Jan 31, 2023

On December 1, 2022 the FCC began granting the new EBS licenses to the winning bidders from Auction 108.  Since many of these licenses are not for complete counties or for the entire auction channel size, I thought it would be useful to see how these licenses appear on the FCC licensing system.

For an example, I have chosen the first auction channel (C1) for Iowa county, Wisconsin, which was purchased by Michigan Wireless.

The map for this license shows all of Iowa county highlighted and all of the C1 frequencies highlighted as well.  (If the images are too small to read all of the details, right click on the image and select <Open image in new tab>.

Now looking at the market tab, we will focus on the information at the bottom of the screen.  First, all of the 9 component channels (A1, A2, A3, B1, B2, B3, C1, C2, C3) are listed above the county with a full county population value.  This would indicate that this license is authorized to cover all 23,687 people living in Iowa county, WI.

Looking back at our outputs from the EBS Whitespace Auction Tool, we can see that representing this license as a complete county license for all of the component channels is not correct.

In our Population Percentage output, it is clear that Michigan Wireless did not purchase the rights to use the B1, B2, and B2 component channels because they were leased to T-Mobile through their lease with the State of Wisconsin -Educational Communications Board.  It is also clear that 3% of the county's population cannot be covered with the A1, A2, and A3 component channels.

To see these numbers as raw population values, we will look at our Population output.  In this view you can see the population that is licensed for each component channel and the only channels that cover the complete county population are the C1, C2, and C3 channels.

To be accurate, the FCC's market page should be updated to show the actual population available for each channel as seen below:

With the maps updated to show the actual license area for each component channel.

2502.0-2507.5, 2507.5-2513.0, 2513.0-2518.5 MHz (A1,A2,A3):

2518.5-2524.0, 2524.0-2529.5, 2529.5-2535.0 MHz (B1, B2, B3):

2535.0-2540.5, 2540.5-2546.0, 2546.0-2551.5 MHz (C1, C2, C3)

Which Licenses will T-Mobile Get from Columbia Capital? Thu, Aug 25, 2022

A little over a week ago, T-Mobile announced that they were purchasing additional 600MHz spectrum from Columbia Capital.  Immediately, we began receiving phone calls to determine which markets T-Mobile would be increasing their 600MHz spectrum holdings.  Unfortunately, the FCC application for this transaction has not be filed so our best view into these licenses is found by finding the licenses that T-Mobile is currently leasing from Columbia Capital.

Looking first at the Spectrum Grid in our Web Spectrum Viewer, we can see the markets and the channels that Columbia Capital controls.  Our Spectrum Grid can display 3 types of spectrum ownership data:  1) The license owner (FCC), 2) The current operator (Current), or 3) The Future Owner.  In this example we want to find the spectrum that Columbia Capital owns, so we are choosing FCC in the filters.

3.45GHz Auction Results Sat, Jan 15, 2022

On Friday, the FCC posted the results from Auction 110.  On Saturday we updated the January 2021 release of our Mobile Carrier - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool to reflect the auction results.  These results provide the most detailed view of each carrier's spectrum that can be deployed for 5G, particularly all of the available upper mid-band spectrum including EBS/BRS, 3.45GHz, CBRS, and C-band.

In the Spectrum Grid, we can see the channel allocations.  In general, Dish took the upper end of the band with T-Mobile and AT&T alternate having the lower parts of the band.  In many markets, AT&T is pinned in the middle of the band between T-Mobile, Grain, and Columbia Capital.  Each of the spectrum investors has selected spectrum assignments adjacent to AT&T's spectrum meaning they are each well positioned to sell to AT&T if the 3.45GHz spectrum cap is lifted. 

In the National Band Ownership slides we look at each carrier's ownership based upon the percent of MHz-POPs that they control.

For the 3.45GHz band, AT&T leads the way with 39% of the MHz-POPs, Dish has 30%, T-Mobile has 12%, and USCellular has 4%.  

Looking the the complete picture for Upper Mid-band spectrum, T-Mobile still leads with 34%, Verizon follows with 30%, then AT&T with 24%.  Dish has 9% of the upper mid-band MHz-POPs and USCellular has 2%.

EBS Spectrum Control Maps Mon, Nov 01, 2021

In our most recent blog post, we highlighted the challenges faced by T-Mobile in two markets where they don't control parts of the EBS spectrum (channels), that limit their deployment of large 5G channels across each urban market.  Where that post focused on the effects of owning or not owning a specific channel across a geography, the EBS Spectrum Control Maps below provide a more general look at the percent of EBS spectrum that T-Mobile owns, the FCC owns, and Other Carriers own.  To complete this analysis we used the MHz-POPs analysis from our EBS Auction Tool, combined with our analysis of T-Mobile's EBS MHz-POPs using the same geographic licensing database.  

While these maps provide insights on the EBS band in totality, the individual issues faced by T-Mobile in Orange County, CA don't strongly appear in these maps because they control all of the EBS channels except the G channels meaning they still control a high percentage of the EBS spectrum in Orange County.    For the Chicago market, the whitespace EBS challenges can be seen  with Lake County receiving a light green and McHenry receiving an orange.

Deficiencies of T-Mobile’s 2.5GHz Spectrum Tue, Oct 26, 2021

Recent discussions around the wireless industry have included opining on why T-Mobile acquired 40MHz of C-band spectrum when they control so much 2.5GHz spectrum.  Although the 2.5GHz spectrum is a valuable spectrum asset, there are two challenges to this spectrum that are not well understood by the industry and we believe that T-Mobile’s C-band purchases were a strategic purchase to provide a path to overcome these two spectrum licensing limitations.

License Areas Controlled by the FCC:

The first limitation is unlicensed or whitespace areas in core urban markets. To highlight these areas, we are going to start with some whitespace analysis that we have developed as part of our EBS Auction Tool.  In this analysis, the percentage of the population that is available in the whitespace area is indicated for each EBS channel in a county.  We have also calculated the percentage of the population that is contained with T-Mobile license area and the percentage of the population that is contained within the license area of any other carrier. In the image below we are showing the percentage of the population under T-Mobile’s control and under the FCC control (whitespace) for the entire 2.5GHz frequency band including both the EBS and BRS channels.  The color ranges start at 0% with red, 50% with yellow, and 100% with green.  In our initial analysis we will be focusing on the first auction channel (black box) in the six counties that make up the Chicago CMA market.  We prefer to use the CMA market structure to evaluate urban areas because they include only the most populated counties in each urban area.

2.5GHz Full-band Population Percentage View (Chicago):

2.5GHz – 1^st EBS Auction Channel Population Percentage View (Chicago):

           

In the top section of the chart above, it is apparent that T-Mobile controls all of the 1^st EBS Auction channel in Cook, DuPage, and Will counties but they only control all of the A1-A2-A3 channels in Kane County.  Fortunately, the parts of 1st EBS Auction channel that they don’t own will be available in the Auction 108.  The available whitespace is indicated in the lower half of the chart.  Looking at McHenry County, 100% of the C1-C2 channels will be available in the EBS Auction (108).

These charts highlights the percentage of the population available either for T-Mobile’s licenses or for the FCC’s whitespace.  Next we will look at the geographic constraints of T-Mobile’s licenses and the shape of each county’s whitespace area.  In the map below we are able to show the license areas for the A1-A2-A3 channels because the license areas of interest are identical.  It is apparent that T-Mobile has the rights to operate the A1-A2-A3 channels completely across the counties in the Chicago CMA except Lake and McHenry.

Licensing Map – A1-A2-A3 (Chicago):

Looking at the B1-B2-B3 & C3 channels, a whitespace area exists covering almost all of Kane County along with similar whitespace areas in McHenry and Lake counties.

Licensing Map – B1-B2-B3 & C3 (Chicago):

Our final map delineates the largest limitations to the areas that T-Mobile can deploy the C1-C2 channels in the Chicago CMA market.  Their base stations located in the gray areas of Kane, Lake, and McHenry counties cannot use the C1-C2 channels.  

Licensing Map – C1-C2 (Chicago):

Looking again at the T-Mobile’s control of the 1^st EBS auction channel we can highlight the deployment limitations that the whitespace area presents.  Since the 1^st Auction channel is 49.5MHz, this chart indicates that T-Mobile can deploy roughly a 50MHz channel on any sites in Cook, DuPage, and Will counties.  In Kane County they are limited to a 15MHz channel in the available 16.5MHz of spectrum.  To have a consistent deployment of a 50MHz channel across Chicago, they would need to purchase the whitespaces areas for each of these channels in each of the Chicago counties.

 

 

 

Looking again at the T-Mobile’s control of the 1^st EBS auction channel we can highlight the deployment limitations that the whitespace area presents.  Since the 1^st Auction channel is 49.5MHz, this chart indicates that T-Mobile can deploy roughly a 50MHz channel on any sites in Cook, DuPage, and Will counties.  In Kane County they are limited to a 15MHz channel in the available 16.5MHz of spectrum.  To have a consistent deployment of a 50MHz channel across Chicago, they would need to purchase the whitespaces areas for each of these channels in each of the Chicago counties.

The last perspective that we want to share on the Chicago market is the actual population in each of the whitespace areas for each county. Although we thought that 100% of the population was available for each channel in Cook County, the whitespace population table indicates that there is a very small population and small geographic area that is a whitespace within Cook County for the B1-B2-B3-C1-C2-C3 channels.

2.5GHz – 1^st EBS Auction Channel Population View - Whitespace (Chicago):

License Areas Controlled by Other Carriers:

The second limitation is spectrum blocks that are controlled by other carriers in core urban markets. To highlight these areas we are going to look at the four counties in the Los Angeles CMA market.  For the Population Percentage Chart below, we are including the population percentage for other carriers rather than the whitespace percentages.

2.5GHz Full-band Population Percentage View (Los Angeles):

2.5GHz – 3rd EBS Auction Channel Population Percentage View (Los Angeles):

In the Top View it is apparent that T-Mobile already controls the spectrum across all of the BRS channels (gray) in Los Angeles County but they are missing roughly 10% of the population for the G1-G2-G3 channels. In between the two BRS blocks of spectrum are the K guard band channels.  The ownership of these guard band channels mirrors the ownership of the primary channel e.g. G1=KG1.    The BRS channels and the EBS G1-G2-G3 channels total to 87MHz of spectrum, providing T-Mobile the ability to deploy an 80MHz NR channel throughout most of Los Angeles County.  Unfortunately in Orange County, another carrier owns 98% of the G1-G2-G3 channels limiting T-Mobile to a 10MHz channel in the first BRS block (F4-E4) and a 50MHz channel in the second BRS block  (BRS2-E123-F123-H123).  

Los Angeles CMA Counties:

In looking at the G1-G2-G3 licensing map, you can see that there are actually three licenses that T-Mobile does not control in the Los Angeles CMA Market.

Licensing Map – G1-G2-G3:

 2.5GHz – 3rd Auction Channel Population View – Other Carriers (Los Angeles):

 

The Other Carriers Population percentage view indicates the large licensed population that is controlled by other carriers and would need to be purchased by T-Mobile.

Conclusion:

With these two examples we have shown that missing 2.5GHz spectrum either due to it being unlicensed or being controlled by another carrier present challenges that likely limit T-Mobile’s largest 5G channel size to a subset of each urban market.  We believe that T-Mobile’s participation in the C-band and the current 3.45GHz auction was to “future” proof their ability to offer large channel sizes in the upper mid-band spectrum.  With either the C-band spectrum or the 3.45GHz spectrum, T-Mobile could use carrier aggregation to achieve 100MHz effective channel sizes even in areas where their 2.5GHz spectrum is more limited.

T-Mobile's 600MHz Spectrum Leases - More work still needs to be done Tue, Sep 22, 2020

Assessing the COVID Temporary Spectrum Licenses Tue, Mar 31, 2020

Last week we began to see announcements from the FCC authorizing a series of temporary spectrum usage agreements to provide additional spectrum to several of the wireless operators to increase network capacity as workers are dispatched to their homes.

We will look at the effect of these agreements in a few markets to see how they are increasing LTE capacity.  The analysis will be supported with outputs from our Mobile Carrier - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool  specifically the Spectrum Ownership Grid.

T-Mobile 600MHz Capacity Expansion:

The first agreement provides T-Mobile with access to 600MHz spectrum from Bluewater Wireless, Channel 51 LIcense Co and LB License Co (Columbia Capital), CC Wireless Investment (Comcast), ParketB.com Wireless (Dish), New Level (Grain), and Tstar License Holdings (Tri-Star).

In the image below for the New York CMA market, T-Mobile will have access to Comcast's spectrum (XFI) and Dish's spectrum increasing their 600MHz channel size in New York from 10MHz channel to a 20MHz channel.  T-Mobile would have access to the entire 35MHz of spectrum so they could provide a 20MHz channel and a 10MHz channel for capacity.   Because T-Mobile has already deployed Band 71 equipment in New York, they can turn up the expanded spectrum without additional equipment installations.

USCellular AWS-3 Capacity Expansion:

The next agreement provides USCellular access to AWS-3 spectrum from their bidding partner Advantage Spectrum.  In the image below a few of the Washington markets where USCellular will access AWS-3 spectrum are indicated.  In most of these markets, USCellular currently operates on their cellular frequencies but doesn't have Band 66 operations.Thus,  USCellular will need to add base stations and antennas to their sites for Band 66 to utilize these new frequencies.  In five of these counties USCellular is likely operating on AWS-1 spectrum in Band 66 so the spectrum will be easier to deploy in those counties. 

Verizon AWS-3 Capacity Expansion:

In the image below we illustrate the AWS-3 spectrum that Verizon will gain temporary access from SNR License Co and Northstar Wireless (both Dish partners).  Northstar controls the AWS-3 G channel and SNR LIcense Co controls the AWS-3 H channel.  In the New York market, Northstar Wireless owns the G block spectrum and SNR Wireless owns the H block spectrum.  Accessing this spectrum will provide Verizon a second Band 66 LTE channel, increasing their LTE capacity from 20MHz to 30MHz.

Verizon & AT&T AWS-3 Capacity Expansion:

Verizon and AT&T have also requested access to the spectrum that Northstar Wireless and SNR Wireless returned to the FCC when their auction discounts were eliminated.  The AWS-3 spectrum depth that is "unassigned" is indicated in the map below.  In our data, we reflect these unassigned licenses with the FCC heading.

AT&T requested the I block spectrum in the New York market, so it will expand their Band 66 LTE from 10MHz to 15MHz.  The markets AT&T requested are listed here and the markets that Verizon requested are here.

AT&T AWS-4 Capacity Expansion:

AT&T has also requested access to Dish's Band 66 spectrum.  From the image above AT&T can expand their Band 66 LTE by and additional 5MHz to 20MHz by using part of Dish's AWS-4 spectrum.  AT&T will still have an additional 15MHz of Dish's spectrum that they could use as an additional LTE channel in New York.  AT&T only requested access to Dish's Band 66 spectrum, not their Band 70 AWS-4 spectrum.

AT&T 700MHz E-block Expansion:

Dish also reported that AT&T requested access the the 700MHz E-block in the markets that AT&T doesn't own.  In the image below, Dish's ownership in Chicago and Detroit will provide AT&T the capability to expand their Band 29 supplemental downlink from 5MHz to 10MHz.

Historical Spectrum Data - A Look Back to 2012...MetroPCS, SpectrumCo, Clearwire, and Leap Wireless Mon, Jan 20, 2020

One of the benefits of Allnet Insights' Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tools, is the repository of monthly releases that we have accumulated. With the USA Mobile Carrier Tool we have monthly versions going back to July 2012.  Each of our historical tools details spectrum ownership and the variety of spectrum depth analysis modules that were supported at that time.  

I thought it would be interesting to look back at the spectrum ownership landscape from July 2012.  Looking first at our Spectrum Grid for low band spectrum, you can see that Verizon still holds the 700MHz B block licenses that were sold later to AT&T.  In addition, Verizon also holds the 700MHz A block licenses that were sold to T-Mobile.  

Looking next at the lower mid band spectrum, former licensees like SpectrumCo, Leap Wireless, and MetroPCS still control blocks of AWS-1 and PCS spectrum.  This view of spectrum ownership also allows you to see how Verizon consolidated their AWS-1 spectrum holdings with SpectrumCo's holdings into a 20 MHz block through spectrum license trades with T-Mobile and their MetroPCS licenses.  Today Verizon controls the lower 20 MHz of the AWS-1 band and T-Mobile controls the upper 25 MHz in the New York / New Jersey counties.

Looking at the upper mid band spectrum we first see all of the original WCS spectrum licensees:  Horizon Wi-Com, Nextwave, Sprint, Comcast, and San Diego Gas & Electric.  Clearwire also appears in the upper mid band Spectrum Grid with their 2.5GHz spectrum holdings.

It is interesting then to look at our County Analysis module to see the detail on each carrier's spectrum depth.  It is noteworthy to mention that Verizon has 119 MHz of spectrum in most of the New York / New Jersey counties with AT&T trailing with 91 MHz of spectrum.  Verizon still sits with rough the same amount of spectrum although they replaced all of the 700MHz spectrum they sold to AT&T and T-Mobile with SpectrumCo spectrum and AWS-3 spectrum while AT&T has growth while AT&T has grown their spectrum depth in the same counties to 161 MHz.

5G New Radio (NR) Band Analysis Tue, Jul 23, 2019

In July we expanded the analysis capabilities of our Mobile Carrier and Millimeter Wave - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tools to include 5G New Radio(NR) Band Analysis for each of the 3GPP supported bandwidths in each US NR band class.

First, in the Mobile Carrier Tool, we are supporting both the uplink and downlink NR bands separately for bands that provide Frequency Division (FDD) operation.  This analysis module outputs the largest channel size (for both uplink and downlink) that a carrier could deploy in their 5G/LTE uplink carrier aggregation scheme or their downlink carrier aggregation scheme. Below in the downlink analysis for AT&T you can see the maximum channel sizes for n12 band spectrum (700MHz A/B/C) versus their n29 band spectrum (700MHz D/E),which is downlink only, and their n14 band spectrum (FirstNet); for each county in the New York Cellular Market Area (CMA).

Similarly, the uplink analysis indicates the maximum uplink channel size for all of the uplink spectrum.

The n41 band spectrum that Sprint's controls (2.5GHz) is seen in the Time Division Duplex(TDD) section.  The analysis tool determines the largest contiguous channel that Sprint can deploy with their leases/owned spectrum including the mid-band segment guard bands.  From the results below, Sprint can configure 80MHz 5G/LTE channels in two New York counties and they can configure a 60MHz channel in one additional New York county.  The remaining counties are limited to carrier aggregation of 20MHz channels. 

In the Millimeter Wave - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool, all of the spectrum is configured to Time Division Duplex(TDD) operation.  Below, you can see the different bandwidths that T-Mobile can deploy using their 24GHz or 28GHz spectrum in the New York counties.   Each of the 3GPP standardized bandwidths of 400, 200, 100, and 50MHz are detailed for each spectrum band.

39GHz - Auction 103 Reconfiguration Analysis - Number Blocks Tue, Mar 26, 2019

On March 21st, the FCC released a Notice of Procedures describing how existing 39GHz spectrum ownership below will be remapped to the new 39GHz configuration.  We thought it would be beneficial to see how the FCC arrived at their results.

Current Configuration:

Future Configuration:

The procedures the FCC announced will provide a route for the existing 39GHz owners to essentially trade-in their spectrum for vouchers that can be used in Auction 103.  The FCC published a summary of the aggregated holdings data for each of the 39GHz licensees so we decided to use the data from our Millimeter Wave - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool to show the underlying calculations.

We are able to use the data from our Millimeter Wave - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool to determine the aggregate MHz-POPs value for PEA003 (Chicago).  To find the aggregate MHz-POPs we must first find the MHz-POPs contribution for each of AT&T's licenses (call signs) in the Chicago market.  Below are each of the county MHz-POPs components for each call sign.  We have indicated whether the license covers the entire county or whether it is a partial license in the Full/Partial County column.  The county MHz-POPs component is found by multiplying the bandwidth for each call sign by the county population.  The total aggregate MHz-POPs is the sum of the county MHz-POPs for all of AT&T's licenses.  Using this process, we have found AT&T's aggregate MHz-POPs to by 2,817,188,800 compared to the FCC's results of 2,815,434,000.

The Market MHz-POPs value is found by multiplying the new 39GHz channel size (100MHz) by the total population of the Chicago PEA.  

The next calculation provides the number of blocks that AT&T is authorized to receive in the 39GHz auction by relinquishing their current licenses.  Our analysis indicates that AT&T will start with slightly more than 3 - 100MHz channel blocks in Chicago before the auction starts.

Licensed Spectrum Survey for DAS and Small Cell Implementation Mon, Nov 05, 2018

Two questions for all of the wireless network installers and drive testers:

1)  Where can you get the spectrum assignments for all of the mobile carrier bands with in a county?

2)  How can you determine if the licensed spectrum assignment will change in the near future?

Allnet Insights' Web Spectrum Viewer now includes a Wireless Survey which details the wireless carrier that currently controls each block of Mobile Carrier spectrum (600MHz-2.5GHz) for a selected US county.  In addition, the Wireless Survey indicates whether there are any filed transaction that will move that spectrum to another wireless carrier, as indicated in the Future column.

The output table details the spectrum assignments,licensees, and bandwidth for each block and is sorted from lowest frequency to highest frequency.  This output table can be exported as a .csv file.  

Weekly FCC Spectrum Transactions Mon, Oct 22, 2018

Millimeter Wave - Upper Microwave Flexible Use (Auction Channels) Thu, Aug 30, 2018

Transforming the 2.5 GHz Band Tue, Apr 24, 2018

On April 19th, the FCC opened a docket to collect comments related to "Transforming the 2.5 GHz Band".  As background, the US 2.5GHz spectrum band encompasses 33 channels.  20 channels (A, B, C, D, and G groups) are designated for Educational Broadcast Service (EBS) and 13 (BRS1/2, E, F, and H) are designated for Broadband Radio Service (BRS).  

License Area:

Sprint owns a vast majority of the BRS licenses and leases a vast majority of the EBS licenses.  The licensing limitations for this spectrum are drawn from its origins providing broadcast video services.  The original licenses were formed as 35 mile radius circles centered on the video transmitting site.  When two licenses overlapped, a football shaped area would be formed.  A line would be drawn through the end points of the "football" splitting the overlapping license area between the two licensees.  BRS licenses include both 35 mile radius licenses, geographic area licenses (entire BTA) and Entire BTA license with cutouts for existing 35 mile radius licenses.

In 2009, a Broadband Radio Service auction (Auction 86) included the remaining unlicensed areas within each BTA for the BRS channels, but the unlicensed area in each BTA for the EBS channels was not auctioned.

Channel Plan Transition:

Prior to this point, Clearwire was launching pre-WiMax networks on the EBS/BRS pre-transition band plan which was designed around video operation.  As you can see in the Pre-Transition chart below, the A channels (A1, A2, A3, and A4) are separated by the B channels (B1, B2, B3, and B4).  This allowed all of the A channels to be broadcast at a video site without interference.  Clearwire would need to control both sets of the "interleaved" channels to have enough contiguous spectrum to launch their RAN network in a market.

To facilitate data network deployments and to protect the remaining video operations the FCC provided a way to transistion licenses to the Post-Transition band plan on a BTA market basis.  If there was a significant commercial video operation in a market, that BTA market was able waived from transition and it stayed with the Pre-Transition band plan.  The Post-Transition band plan put the remaining video operators into the mid-band segment (A4, B4, C4, D4, G4, F4, and E4) and provides contiguous spectrum (16.5MHz) for the rest of the channel group (e.g. A1, A2, and A3)

FCC Request for Comments:

License Area:

The FCC has expressed a desire to make the EBS unlicensed area available for use.  The FCC has asked whether the expansion of the licenses should include the entirety of the census tracks that license (35 mile) intersects or the entire county that the license intersects.  The map below from the National EBS Association (NEBSA) illustrates the counties that would be added to each intersecting EBS license for the A1 channel.  For the carriers that already lease these licenses, they would have the opportunity to deploy sites on the larger license area and would likely also pay the licensee a higher monthly payment due to the increase in licensed population.   As you can also note below, this approach still leaves all of the white counties unlicensed.

 The FCC would like to license the white counties in a 4 step manner:

1. Existing licenses could extend their license areas to the borders of the counties they currently intersect but there may be requirements on how much of each county you must already cover.
2. Rural tribal nations can apply for licenses covering their local area.  License areas could be census tracks or counties.
3. Accredited schools or governmental entities can apply for their local area licenses.  License areas could be census tracks or counties.
4. Auction remaining unlicensed area with competitive bidding.

Service Rules:

The FCC is also proposing to change the service rules for the EBS spectrum to allow the spectrum to be sold to commercial operators rather than requiring leases.

Remaining Pre-transition Markets:

The FCC is also proposing to complete transitioning the remaining pre-transition markets so a consistent band plan would be in use nationwide.  A few wireless cable operators had received waivers but most of those operators have ceased operations.  This will clear interference issues between markets and facilitate the deployment of data in the Lower Band Segment (A,B,C, and D groups) and the Upper Band Segment (E,F,G, and H groups).  Video operations will continue in the Mid Band Segment (A4, B4, C4, D4,G4,F4, and E4) in the markets where they operate today.

New Millimeter Wave Spectrum Bands Thu, Apr 05, 2018

In our last post we were discussing  the next steps for the US millimeter wave spectrum after FiberTower and the FCC settled FiberTower's licensing issues.  As we prepare for a 28GHz auction in November, and a 24GHz auction early next year, let's take a look at how each of the new millimeter wave frequency bands are configured.  Each of these images is taken from our updated Millimeter Wave - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool which is now reflecting the new channel band plans for 24GHz, 37GHz, and 47GHz.

24 GHz Spectrum:

In this view we show both the expanded 24GHz band configuration and the old 24GHz configuration. All of the spectrum depth values are calculated from the New 24GHz data. We have left the old 24GHz configuration, so you can continue to see the remaining 24GHz spectrum licenses which will need to be moved over to the New 24GHz by the FCC. The current licenses are licensed for a 40MHz uplink and 40MHz downlink which won't map properly to the new band plan.

37GHz Spectrum:

For the 37/39GHz bands we show the new 37GHz band alongside the reconfigured 39GHz band.  The new 39GHz columns are not populated because the existing spectrum holders will need to be transitioned to the larger/unpaired channels in the new 39GHz plan.  We are providing spectrum depth values for the new 37GHz spectrum and the old 39GHz spectrum.

47GHz Spectrum:

We have added the new 47GHz band configurations to the Spectrum Grid and each of the spectrum depth modules.

PEA Market Analysis:

Our last addition, is a PEA Market Analysis module.  This module displays spectrum depths for each selected carrier using the new FCC Auction market structure.  For the 28GHz auction, you can see the amount of spectrum that will be available in each of the PEAs in the LMDS A (FCC) column on the far right of the chart.

Visualize 600MHz Reserved Spectrum Thu, Sep 07, 2017

With the September 2017 release of our Mobile Carrier - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool, we have also added the ability to visualize and track the 600MHz reserved spectrum by county or by market.

In our Spectrum Grid default view, you are able to visualize which spectrum blocks are designated as reserved for the counties in each of the most populated Cellular Market Area (CMA) markets.



To display the reserved spectrum for all of the counties within a Partial Economic Area (PEA) market, you can sort the county data using the PEA # column.

Where Else will T-Mobile Deploy 600MHz - LTE? Wed, Aug 16, 2017

Today, T-Mobile announced further details on the deployment plans for their 600MHz spectrum.  Let's review what we indicated back in April.

The green areas are the areas that we expected T-Mobile to deploy a 5x5 LTE channel using their 600MHz spectrum.  Let's check these areas with the press release:

• Wyoming         
• Northwest Oregon     
• West Texas     
• Southwest Kansas     
• Oklahoma panhandle     
• Western North Dakota     
• Maine     
• Coastal North Carolina     
• Central Pennsylvania     
• Central Virginia     
• Eastern Washington     

Central Pennsylvania appears to be our only miss in this T-Mobile list.  It is strange that T-Mobile is emphasizing a 600MHz deployment in an area they already control the 700MHz -A Block spectrum.

Comparing the Millimeter Wave Deals Fri, Jun 23, 2017

Yesterday Allnet Insights & Analytics presented at the Wells Fargo 5G forum.  Below are several of the slides that describe the millimeter wave spectrum holdings for each of the parties involved in the current millimeter wave deals. Each of these slides is a direct analysis output from our Millimeter Wave - Spectrum Ownership Analysis Tool.  In these slides we have selected 8 carriers from the 173 carriers available in the tool. The first slide compares the National Weighted Average spectrum depth for each of the carriers.  Verizon's spectrum position is displayed as NextLink Wireless since Verizon at the time this slide was created was only leasing NextLink's spectrum.  In this set of slides we also highlight the risk surrounding the FiberTower transaction for AT&T.  The largest portion of the FiberTower transaction is for licenses that the FCC has terminated.  It is unknown how many of these licenses will be restored and added to AT&T's spectrum holdings.

 While the National Average slide highlights how much spectrum each carrier has on average across the county, networks are deployed using the available spectrum within a market.  The slides below highlight the amount of spectrum that each carrier has in a CMA (Cellular Market Area).  The Top 5 markets are in the first slide including Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Dallas and Houston.

 The remaining Top 10 markets are in the second slide: Philadelphia, Washington D.C., Detroit, Atlanta, and Boston. 

 The last slide highlights the estimated MHz-POPs for each of the carriers for their Millimeter Wave spectrum.  It is worth noting that the ranges for Mobile Carrier spectrum (600MHz-2.5GHz) for the National Carriers is 30B MHz-POPs to 65B MHz-POPs.  On this chart, the lowest range is 50B MHz-POPs.