Efforts to allow wholesalers of LightSquared, the US 4GLTE venture, to offer terrestrial-only services have been hit by interference concerns from Federal agencies including the Department of Defense.
LightSquared filed a request to the FCC on November…
Efforts to allow wholesalers of LightSquared, the US 4GLTE venture, to offer terrestrial-only services have been hit by interference concerns from Federal agencies including the Department of Defense.
LightSquared filed a request to the FCC on November 18 to adjust the rules governing its ATC licence, which currently requires it being used in conjunction with a fully integrated satellite/terrestrial network.
At the time, Jeffrey Carlisle, the group’s VP for regulatory affairs, told SatelliteFinance he was optimistic its request would be approved quickly, because the revised business plan continued to offer wholesalers a satellite-only or integrated service.
However, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) sent a letter to the FCC on January 12, raising the “significant interference concerns” of government agencies and satellite operator Inmarsat.
The letter called on the FCC to ensure that LightSquared’s plans, which are expected to dramatically increase its terrestrial usage, do not “adversely impact Global Positioning System (GPS) and Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receivers, maritime and aeronautical emergency communication systems, and Inmarsat receivers used by the Federal agencies”.
The NTIA is urging the FCC to defer action on the waiver until these interference issues are satisfactorily addressed.
LightSquared has committed up to US$20m to fund an industry group to work towards resolving these concerns.
Sanjiv Ahuja, the venture’s CEO, said on January 6 in an email to NTIA, before its FCC intervention, that he was hoping the regulator would deliver a “quick and favourable action so that we may continue to roll out our network and meet the rigorous construction timetable that the FCC has made a condition of our authorisation”.
This timetable requires the group to cover at least 100 million people in the US by December 31, 2012, at least 145 million people by the end of December the following year, and at least 260 million people by December 31, 2015.
LightSquared and European vendor Nokia Siemens Networks, which is building the venture’s terrestrial network, declined to comment.
SkyTerra-1 issue resolved
The concerns over LightSquared’s terrestrial network could prove to be a significant setback for the venture’s otherwise run of good luck.
The group was able to solve an issue in December that prevented the full deployment of its first bird, enabling it to hit an extended ATC milestone deadline with the FCC to commence satellite operations by January 1, 2011.
Satellite contractor Boeing, which manufactured the SkyTerra-1 spacecraft, confirmed its 22 metre-L-band reflector had been fully unfurled in a statement sent to media outlets on December 14.
“Although the occasional delay in a full deployment sometimes occurs on a satellite, it is not a situation we face very often,” said Craig Cooning, VP and general manager at Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems.
The manufacturer had assembled a team of experts with antenna supplier Harris Corp to solve the reflector anomaly, which was identified following the satellite’s November 14 launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
A failure to fully deploy the bird would have forced the venture to launch a spare satellite at a significant cost for its hedge fund backers Harbinger, which has also heavily invested in Terrestar Network, the fellow ATC-licence holding satellite operator that is currently in Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Boeing will continue to carry out a series of on-orbit checks over the next several months before fully handing the bird to LightSquared.
Martin Harriman, LightSquared’s VP of ecosystem development and satellite business, said: “We congratulate the Boeing, Harris and LightSquared teams who have worked diligently over the past week to successfully deploy the SkyTerra-1 L-band reflector.
“We look forward to Boeing’s completion of in-orbit testing of the SkyTerra-1 satellite and handing over this Space Based Network to us in early 2011. LightSquared is proceeding on schedule with its roll-out of the nation’s first integrated wireless broadband and satellite network.” News of the satellite’s antenna success also served as an early Christmas present for the insurance community, which faced seeing a healthy year of profit for space insurers turn into one of just over break-even.
For 2010, the global income for the industry insurers is approximately US$884m, while claims so far have reached around US$373m.
Willis is SkyTerra 1’s broker.
