Saturday, September 22, 2012

LightSquared redux: Lawmakers admit lack of expertise, but blame FCC

LightSquared redux: Lawmakers admit lack of expertise, but blame FCC:





US Rep Cliff Stearns (R-FL) is mad at the FCC for halting LightSquared's plan to build a cellular network.





The saga of LightSquared and its failed plan to build a nationwide LTE network on spectrum adjacent to that used by GPS receivers has been debated ad nauseam. But one party didn’t get involved until after LightSquared’s plan was defeated: the US House of Representatives committee with primary jurisdiction over the matter.
When its members got together today to discuss the LightSquared/GPS controversy, they freely admitted lacking any sort of technical expertise regarding GPS, cellular networks, or use of spectrum. But that didn’t stop most of them from blasting the FCC executives they called before them for favoring the needs of GPS users over those of LightSquared.
Today's hearing was held by the Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, which opened its investigation just after the FCC dismissed LightSquared's proposal in February. (For background, see Why LightSquared failed: It was science, not politics.) One of the few members sympathetic to the FCC, US Rep. Diana DeGette, (D-CO), noted that several other House committees examined the LightSquared/FCC matter over the past two years, but as the committee with primary jurisdiction she said she wishes "we’d looked at it sooner."
Read 39 remaining paragraphs | Comments


DIGITAL JUICE

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thank's!