It's Silicon Valley vs. Telcos in Battle for Wireless Spectrum Frank Rose Email 05.16.07 | 2:00 AM
<http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2007/05/uhf_spectrum> Apple's iPhone may be the most eagerly awaited gadget of the year, but when it finally goes on sale some time next month, only 30 percent of US mobile phone customers -- those who subscribe to AT&T's wireless service -- will be able to use it. Verizon subscribers might have had a shot, but executives at that carrier nixed the idea of letting an Apple device onto their network years ago. It's as if Mac owners had to connect to the internet through AT&T because their machines wouldn't work on Verizon, Comcast or Time Warner Cable. The wire-line internet doesn't work that way, and wireless doesn't have to either. By the end of this year, the FCC is expected to start auctioning a frequency band that could be used for a wireless network that any device -- be it a cell phone, laptop, desktop, TV or toaster -- would be able to connect to. A proposal to build such a network has been presented by Frontline Wireless, a startup backed by three of Silicon Valley's biggest players: Venture capitalist John Doerr, Google angel investor Ram Sriram and one-time Netscape CEO James Barksdale. But Frontline will be bidding against behemoths like Cingular and Verizon, and whether it has a chance will be determined within the next few weeks, when the FCC sets the rules for the auction. The spectrum that's coming up for grabs is prime stuff: A large, low- frequency band that's currently being used by UHF television stations, which have been ordered to vacate it when broadcasting goes digital in February 2009. UHF may not be as good as VHF, which operates on even lower-frequency spectrum. But it has the ability to carry information through forests, buildings, even mountains, regardless of the weather, and that makes it ideal for broadband wireless, or for mobile-phone service. Ever wonder why Cingular and Verizon, the biggest and most successful U.S. carriers, can offer more reliable service than Sprint or T-Mobile? Because the big boys already own a large band of spectrum near the UHF band, while the little guys are stuck with spectrum that operates at double the frequency and is far less powerful as a result. --------------------------------------------------------------- WWWhatsup NYC http://pinstand.com - http://punkcast.com --------------------------------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.isoc-ny.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
