Radio Survivor

Good news for Yoda and Princess Leah freaks who can’t attend the Star Wars Celebration V in Orlando, Florida. Sirius XM radio is going to cover the whole kibosh for four days. This will include live coverage of the Droid races (which presumably fans could listen to via a Sirius app on their Droid),  and blow by blow accounts of Jedi training reenactments.

The  coverage will be hosted by Sirius XM Raw Dog Comedy’s Mark Says Hi and Cinemagic’s Dave Ziemer. The festivities will begin on August 12 and go through August 15 on Sirius channel 108 and XM channel 139.

I wonder if anyone remembers  the last condition that Sirius XM agreed to meet in order to get the government’s permission to merge. If you recall, click here and we’ll send you a free, lifetime subscription to Radio Survivor. If not . . .

Back in July of 2008, Sirius XM agreed to lease out four percent of its combined full time audio channels—a minimum of twelve channels all told—to “qualified entities,” which everyone presumes means minority broadcasters. A whole lot of candidates have offered to take these channels, but there’s a problem. The FCC has to come up with a process that doesn’t get it sued for establishing an unconstitutional ethnic quota system, or something like that.

So the Commission has been kicking this little monster down the road for almost two years. But a new filing in the Sirius docket suggests the agency may finally be getting its act together (hope springs eternal).

During a phone conversation, one channel candidate reports in his ex parte statement, an agency staffer “stated [that] the FCC had been working through several issues regarding whom, what and or how the Qualified Entity or Entities would be granted the proposed channels. She also hinted that the FCC had been working through several of the issues including Adarand and an application process that is being devised to be implemented.”

You’re probably wondering what that italicized word means. In the Supreme Court case Adarand vs. Pena (1995) the court ruled that Federal affirmative action minority contractor programs must be based on “strict scrutiny.” That is, if they employ racial and ethnic criteria, they have to demonstrate that the racial/ethnic group receiving favor has historically and/or presently faced a disadvantaged situation. The program can’t just be based on race alone.

So, generally speaking, government agencies now do what are called “Adarand Studies” to justify their affirmative action programs. Perhaps that or something like it is being planned here. It should be noted that that summary of this conversation did not come from the FCC but from a channel applicant. But it does seem like the Commission is still trying to get this program going, and may even succeed prior to Howard Stern’s 95th birthday.

source: wikimedia commons

The Federal Communications Commission’s long awaited Order to fix interference problems between Sirius XM [SIRI] and the neighboring Wireless Communications Services (WCS) band is published. Here’s hoping it will at long last resolve this feud, and allow for peaceful coexistence on the 2.3 MHz band. At least that’s the idea, says FCC Chair Julius Genachowski.

“I am pleased that by taking a fresh look at the WCS rules, we are able to create an environment for innovative, cutting-edge mobile products and services in a spectrum band that has essentially remained fallow for years,” Genachowski said on Thursday, “while still protecting adjacent band services from harmful interference and providing important clarity about the long-term operation of satellite radio terrestrial repeaters.”

We’ve been covering this issue for months here at Radio Survivor (see links to related stories at bottom of this piece), and we’ll spare you the hairy technical details. The Order sets up permanent rules for Sirius’s terrestrial repeaters and power level limits for WCS mobile and portable stations.

So now 25 MHz of WCS band is unleashed for wireless broadband, which is kind of exciting!  The FCC’s Order says that WCS license holders have to get moving:

“For mobile and point-to-multipoint services, WCS licensees must serve 40 percent of a license area’s population within 42 months, and 75 percent within 72 months. For fixed point-to-point services, WCS licensees must construct and operate 15 point-to-point links per million persons in a license area within 42 months, and 30 links within 72 months, together with a minimum payload capacity to ensure that the spectrum is used intensively. Licensees will not be required to satisfy submarket construction requirements.”

Here’s hoping that everybody will accept this as a workable compromise.

The Federal Communications Commission has announced that it will issue a Report and Order with coexistence rules for Sirius XM (SIRI) and the Wireless Communications Services band at its next Open Commission meeting, scheduled for May 20:

• “WCS-SDARS Report and Order: A Report and Order that enables robust mobile broadband use of 25 MHz of spectrum in the 2.3 GHz Wireless Communications Service (WCS) band while protecting neighboring incumbent operations.”

One can only hope that this will settle the years old conflict between these services, allow Sirius XM to move forward, and free the WCS license holders to finally roll out WiMAX services in their respective license areas.

Meanwhile, auto industry reps continue to write in on behalf of Sirius XM, the latest coming from the American Trucking Associations:

“Trucking companies and their drivers were among the first to embrace satellite radio and arguably have adopted it more quickly and generally than the public at large,” ATA writes. “In addition to a channel dedicated to trucking talk (Road Dog Trucking Radio) satellite radio’s wide array of programming choices offer a welcome nationwide entertainment option for drivers that spend a considerable portion of their time in the cab. The ‘return on investment’ made by trucking companies and drivers outfitting trucks with SDARS is dependent on continuous high quality, uninterrupted transmission.”

During the May 20 meeting, the FCC will also release the latest edition of its Mobile Wireless Competition Report, analyzing the state of competition in the mobile industry.

source: wikimedia commons

The great accusation fest which is the struggle between Sirius XM (SIRI) satellite radio and a host of wireless companies went to its next round on Friday, with Sirius accusing the companies of “warehousing” their licenses nearby the service’s bandwidth:

“There can be little question that WCS [Wireless Communications Service] licensees have warehoused spectrum in hopes of receiving regulatory relief to allow them to deploy mobile broadband services – even though such services are precluded under the WCS technical rules the Commission adopted in 1997. The WCS licenses sold for only $13.6 million in the Commission’s 1997 spectrum auction, in large part because of the restrictions the Commission established to protect satellite radio and other adjacent radio services. WCS licensees that have ignored their obligations to build out their spectrum now stand to collect a windfall profit as the Commission considers rule changes to now allow mobile use of the spectrum at the expense of increased interference into the Satellite Radio service. That profit is magnified by the minimal investment in equipment testing and development that WCS licensees have made over the past 13 years.”

Warehousing in spectrum-talk means just sitting on your licenses until you can sell them at a profit or engage in some similarly unproductive activity. (more…)

The Federal Communications Commission has called for comment on proposed rules intended to prevent interference between Sirius XM radio (SIRI)  and wireless broadband in the 2.3 GHz band area. But when Sirius XM asked for a one week extension on the comment deadline, the organization representing the various wireless companies blasted the request.

“At virtually every critical turn in these proceedings, the strategy of Sirius XM Radio Inc. has been the same – delay, delay, delay,” charged a representative of the WCS (Wireless Communications Services) Coalition on Wednesday:

“That is hardly surprising, as Sirius XM has little to gain by adoption of final rules. While those rules will provide Sirius XM with its first permanent authority to operate terrestrial repeaters, those rules are likely to require Sirius XM to modify the terrestrial repeater network that it has been operating pursuant to STAs [Special Temporary Authority permits] for almost a decade, something it consistently has resisted doing. And, adoption of the new rules will subject Sirius XM to new competition from WCS-enabled mobile broadband that provides the public with mobile access to free services like Pandora, Slacker and a range of Internet radio services that largely duplicate, if not improve upon, Sirius XM’s offerings.”

We’ve been following this controversy for a while here at RS. The problem is that licenses in the WCS band and Sirius XM’s SDARS band are scrunched pretty close together, and the FCC worries that SDARS terrestrial repeaters could cause interference to WCS operations. WCS represents Comcast (CMCSA), AT&T, NextWave (WAVE) and other companies that want to launch WiMAX mobile services in their portion of the 2.3 GHz zone. (more…)

Sirius XM has just put out a press release acknowledging that it has received a letter from NASDAQ “stating that the Company has not regained compliance with the $1.00 minimum closing bid price requirement for continued listing on The NASDAQ Global Select Market.”

The satellite radio company says it will ask for a hearing with the NASDAQ Listing Qualifications Panel, at which it will ask to stay on the index “pending its return to compliance.”

“As a result, the NASDAQ staff’s letter has no effect on the listing of SIRIUS XM’s common stock at this time,” Sirius assured its investors.

“SIRIUS XM is one of the most liquid securities on The NASDAQ Global Select Market;” Sirius XM CEO Mel Karmazin added. “We have a large investor base consisting of both individual and prominent institutional stockholders; and our equity capitalization is greater than approximately 92% of the companies listed on The NASDAQ Global Select Market. We are committed to remaining listed on The NASDAQ Global Select Market.”

As we’ve reported, Sirius stock was back on the dollar menu for a while, but  it has definitely fallen into the below 90 cent dumps over the last few days. That earlier rise in fortunes probably helped the company avoid a reverse stock split, in which the number of shares are reduced and the price increased. Here’s what Sirius XM says about a reverse stock split now:

“The Company intends to take all necessary steps to maintain the listing of its common stock on The NASDAQ Global Select Market. The Company’s stockholders have granted the Company’s board of directors the discretion to effect a reverse stock split, which would bring the Company into compliance with the NASDAQ bid price requirement. However, the board of directors intends to effect the reverse stock split only if it determines the action to be in the best interests of stockholders.”

The Federal Communications Commission’s National Broadband Plan is up, and, as expected, it recommends that a wireless band close by the Sirius XM band get 20MHz of spectrum for use to deploy wireless broadband services, probably WiMAX style.

“Recommendation 5.8.1: The FCC should make 20 megahertz available for mobile broadband use in the 2.3 GHz Wireless Communications Service (WCS ) band, while protecting neighboring federal, non-federal Aeronautical Mobile Telemetry (AMT ) and satellite radio operations.”

The FCC established the  WCS band in 1997. Back then it set up rules to protect broadcasts in the nearby Satellite Digital Audio Radio  (SDARS) zone. But now:

“Certain WCS technical rules, particularly the out-of-band emission (OOBE) limits, largely preclude the provision of mobile broadband services in the spectrum. Based on an extensive record, the FCC should revise certain technical rules, including the WCS OOBE limits, to enable robust mobile broadband use of the 2.3 GHz WCS spectrum, while protecting federal, non-federal AMT and satellite radio operations in the neighboring SDARS band.”

The document doesn’t explain how the FCC will propose to do this. As we’ve reported, earlier this month, the agency suggested a non-interference plan to a meeting of Sirius and WCS engineers. Sirius CEO Mel Karmazin told the agency he was “extremely disturbed” about the proposal upon learning of its details. And since Sirius XM fans got wind of this news, they’ve been deluging the FCC’s database with protests.

But the Commission is clearly determined to get WCS the spectrum it needs, somehow. It’s part of the agency’s plan to get 500 megahertz of license space available for broadband within the next decade, “of which 300 megahertz between 225 MHz and 3.7 GHz should be made newly available for mobile use within five years.”

Sirius XM satellite radio CEO Mel Karmazin warned the Federal Communications Commission on Thursday that the FCC’s proposed non-interference rules with a nearby wireless band won’t do.

“We are extremely disturbed by the proposal,” Karmazin confided in a letter sent to the agency’s Chair, Julius Genachowski. “The proposed rules seem to bear little resemblance to the technical record in this proceeding. More importantly, the proposal raises the real and direct threat of crippling interference to our 35 million current listeners and the 90 million satellite radio-equipped vehicles that will share the road with mobile WCS by 2015.”

As we’ve reported, Sirius XM and the owners of spectrum in the Wireless Communications Services band have been wrangling for years about how to avoid interference, given the nearness of their licenses to each other in the 2.3 GHz zone. The owners of WCS, which include AT&T, Comcast, and NextWave, want to step up use of the region for broadband, but these interference concerns have gotten in the way.

Last year, WCS reps proposed compromise limits on transmission power for WCS base stations and Sirius XM repeaters. But Sirius questions whether the interference tests conducted in Ashburn, Virginia upon which the recommendation was based would be as accurate as looking at Clearwire’s WiMAX network in the Philadelphia area, especially when it comes to mobile video use. “As this data was based on the real-world functioning of an operational WiMAX system, it provides a more transparent look into mobile handset performance than any other WiMAX-related information or description previously filed in these proceedings,” the company wrote last month.

WCS and Sirius XM engineers had a meeting about the FCC’s latest proposals on Tuesday. We don’t have a copy of the plan, but here’s the rest of Karmazin’s reaction to it: (more…)

As Federal Communications Commission watchers everywhere know, a huge part of the agency’s strategy to build out the nation’s broadband infrastructure will be to get more spectrum licenses to the wireless industry. In fact, FCC Chair Julius Genachowski says the Commission’s National Broadband Plan will propose freeing up 500 MHz over the next decade. And then there’s this comment from Genachowski, which has me scratching my head a bit:

“The Plan proposes resolving longstanding debates about how to maximize the value of spectrum in bands such as the Mobile Satellite Service (MSS) or Wireless Communications Service (WCS) by giving  licensees the option of new flexibility to put the spectrum toward mobile broadband use—or the option of voluntarily transferring the license to someone else who will.”

We’ve been watching the WCS fight for a while here at Radio Survivor, and (more significantly) so have Volvo, Ford, Chrysler, Comcast, AT&T, NextWave, and quite a few members of the House of Representatives, all of whom have communicated with the FCC on this matter (Mercedes-Benz just filed a week ago).

Here again is the “longstanding debate,” in a nutshell. As the table below indicates, Sirius XM transmits its content over spectrum very close in proximity to the Wireless Communications Services band. (more…)