Carmakers' discredited spectrum claim

Harold Feld destroyed the carmakers' claim they need 75 MHz of dedicated spectrum for safety. Ajit Pai and a unanimous FCC decided to return 45 MHz to public and unlicensed use. The remaining 30 MHz is more than enough for safety needs. The battle now is whether the automakers get more spectrum to send you commercials and possibly to track you. Congressman Pete DeFazio wants to confuse and delay things. He has now asked the GAO to find a way to bring back the discredited safety arguments. (below)

Harold is the most important telecom consumer advocate and did an excellent job explaining this clearly. He writes at Techdirt

For the Auto Industry, It’s About the Money -- Not Saving Lives

Lobbyists have pressed the “safety band” argument consistently, while acting offended whenever someone points out that 30 MHz leaves them plenty of spectrum for actual highway safety uses if the industry just drops the commercial aspect. Of course, the auto industry says it’s “not about the money.” The industry claims it just expects even more awesome safety features at some indefinite time in the future and therefore requires all 75 MHz of spectrum for when that magical day arrives. In the meantime, though, the auto industry argues it might as well use the extra 45 MHz of spectrum for collecting people’s personal driving information and serving them personal ads -- solely in the name of efficiency, of course. 

For the last four years, the auto industry has refused a non-commercial condition on a band that the industry itself claims is strictly for safety.

Politicians lie, often stupidly. That won't change when Trump leaves town. 

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Realme 5G again on sale for US$150

For the Double Eleven sale in China, the Realme V3 5G is selling for 999 yuan, about US$150. It's a decent phone with a 6.5-inch screen, three rear cameras, and a 5,000 mAh battery. The Mediatek Dimensity 720 is similar to the popular Qualcomm 765 in Antutu testing. It should be fine for most practical purposes, although the main camera has only 13 megapixels.

I have raised my 2020 yearend estimate to 230-250 million 5G subs because of the low phone prices and strong sales of the iPhone 5G. Apple is actually selling well in China despite the politics. As those prices move West, I predict 2021 5G sales will explode.

Xiaomi, Vivo, Oppo, and Huawei all have models under US$270 at regular prices. Samsung, Sony, OnePlus, and Meizu are avoiding the price war, staying mostly at $500-600 and above. Apple is over $750. 

Glenn Wellbrock of Verizon: 5 Questions

• Previously at this event, you saw a place for microwave backhaul as part of 5G. If I remember correctly, you said Verizon was ~10% and that might increase to 20%. After 2 years of 5G in the field, does that seem on target?
• Your colleague Lee Hicks tells me the cost per bit has been falling about 40% per year. Is there anything in the technology likely to change that in the next few years? 
• CTIA figures show bandwidth demand on mobile is now growing ~30% per year. Some Europeans are lower than that, some Asians higher. Looking ahead 3-5 years, does 30% traffic growth seem about right or should telcos plan for lower or higher? (While part of planning is to be ready for unexpected growth. I'm asking about your surprise-free assumption.)
• Mike Dano reports Open RAN will not be (widely adopted) by the traditional networks until it can support Massive MIMO. Is he on target?
• What will be the backhaul and fronthaul problems to solve for midband Massive MIMO?

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Telefonica Brazil passes AT&T, Verizon with 16M FTTH homes passed

Enrique Blanco, Telefonica CTO, is telecom's strongest believer in fiber. His Brazilian operation has now passed 16 million homes, almost a quarter of the country. The goal is 24 million in a few years. Only 3 million have purchased so far, but fiber generally catches 40% of broadband after a few years. 

From the financial call:

FTTH revenues were up 56% year-over-year, while IPTV was up 26.9% resulting in a combined growth of 47.3%. Analyst Carlos Sequeira noted, "The FTTH operation is growing super fast. Net additions are impressive. So everything is going super well." He went on to ask if Vivo could even speed up the construction.

This is part of a worldwide trend of adding fiber. In the US, Frontier is building again and talks of 3 million as it exits bankruptcy. BT is passing ~2M homes/year, up from almost nothing three years ago. Orange has just announced it's "accelerating fiber." It has 22 million connections available, most shared with Free. That's over 60% of the country. 

Two years ago, almost no one expected this kind of growth. I didn't.

In six weeks, wireless could reach 30%-60% of students without a connection

The U.S. wireless networks could provide a decent Internet connection - 25 to 75+ Mbps - to tens of millions in weeks. The networks have enough spare capacity, even though Verizon and AT&T have been cutting investment for several years.

The obstacles are cowardice and ignorance in Washington. Buying millions of lines, the government should be paying a wholesale price of $8-15 per month per connection. Of course the companies would rather be paid a retail rate of $30-50 per month, and some in DC don't realize the actual costs or are afraid to take on the telcos.

Telecom is a high fixed cost, low variable cost industry. Verizon and T-Mobile have built a network to ~97% of the population. Once the network is built, the marginal cost of adding a subscriber is $3-7 per month. That's why companies compete to sell Lifeline service at $10/month. (Cable economics are similar, which is why Comcast can sell a $10 offering to the poor.)

20 million homes added at $15/month for 10 months of school is $600 million. That's about 7% of the Universal Service Fund. I believe there is also money allocated to connecting students in the CARES stimulus.

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AT&T killing DSL (Dave in USA Today)

AT&T will "phase out outdated services like DSL and new orders for the service will no longer be supported after October 1." Thanks to Rob Pegoraro for including me in his story. AT&T will continue offering the DSL from their field terminals, calling it fiber to the node. It's the central office connections that are being closed, most under 6 Mbps.  

DSL is now often delivering a gigabit with G.fast. Adtran is actually seeing an uptick in G.fast in Germany, served from fiber to the basement. G.mgfast is still moving in standards, for 3 and 6 Gbps. But the faster DSL requires a terminal in the field, normally backhauled by fiber. That cost money the telcos didn't feel like spending.

Verizon and AT&T, around 2011, “basically gave up on fighting cable over a third of its territory,” I told Rob. Both decided they ultimately saved money with a single, wireless network. They continued to milk the territories for whatever they could get, and hemorrhaged subscribers to cable. Bruce Kushnick discovered that both companies are now down to under 700,000 pure DSL customers, losing more every quarter.

I estimated that DSL remains the only landline choice for 3 to 6% of the U.S. LTE is now routinely 50-125 Mbps. Elon Musk is launching hundreds of low orbit satellites with DSL like latencies. There's little need for slow DSL.

Cable is the best choice for the 2/3rds of the US where the telcos haven't built fiber home.

ASSIA Equipe Work-From-Home Manager

John Cioffi pretty much invented DSL and has spent most of the last 30 years making your connections better. ASSIA developed CloudCheck, which delivered optimum Wi-Fi experience. It announced this week EQUIPE, which manages employees' WI-Fi and connection reliability.

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Realme 5G down to $145

The Realme V3 5G  has a 6.5-inch screen, three rear cameras, and a 5,000 mAh battery. The Mediatek Dimensity 720 is similar to the popular Qualcomm 765 in Antutu testing. It should be fine for most practical purposes, although the main camera has only 13 megapixels. 

CEO Xu Qi expects to sell 50 million phones this year and soon reach 100 million. Realme, Oppo, Vivo & OnePlus are brands of BBK. Added together, in some quarters they are #2 in worldwide phone sales. They spend $billions on research.

 I'm probably going to raise my 2020 yearend estimate of 210,000,000 5G subs because of the low prices and rumors about iPhone 5G.