As expected, T-Mobile was the biggest bidder by a huge margin in the Federal Communications Commission’s just-concluded 2.5-GHz auction.

The carrier’s gross winning bids totaled $304,325,290 for the vast majority of licenses — 7,156 of the 8,017 up for bid, with the other licenses drawing no bids.

The licenses can be used for any terrestrial fixed or mobile service and have buildout requirements of signal coverage of 50% of the license area within four years and 80% within eight years.

T-Mobile was expected to be the primary major player in the auction since the spectrum fits with holes it has in its coverage areas. One veteran spectrum watcher said likely the only reason most other carriers would be bidding was to bid up how much their competitor, T-Mobile, would have to pay to fill those holes.

There were no other big-name winners, with the second-most licenses won (107) by the North American Catholic Educational Programming Foundation and the second gross bid total recorded by PTI Pacifica Inc.

The auction's gross bid total of $427 million will be reduced by quite a bit, as more than three-quarters of the winning bidders qualified for millions of dollars in small business bidding credits applied to their winning prices.

There are 63 winning bidders, 77% of which qualified as small businesses or as entities serving rural ares that will support the introduction of innovative new wireless services in their local communities. In addition, Auction 108 raised gross proceeds exceeding $427 million. 

The FCC voted back in 2019 to free up the band reserved for Educational Broadband Service (EBS) service for 5G, the most likely flexible use. Educational users with the licenses can continue to use it or lease it to others (as many have already been doing), transfer it to someone else, or use it for something else. ▪️

The Federal Communications Commission said 82 applicants have qualified to bid on new midband spectrum in the upcoming 2.5-GHz auction scheduled to begin July 29. The FCC said 11 applicants had not qualified.

Qualified bidders include AT&T, Verizon Communications, T-Mobile, and U.S. Cellular.

Bidders can get early access to the bidding system July 22 and the FCC will hold a mock auction July 26 and 27.

The real auction will begin with a single, six-hour, bidding round July 29 (10 a.m.-4 p.m.), and move to two, two-hour rounds on August 1 (10 a.m.-12 p.m. and 2 p.m.-4 p.m.) going forward, with the pace of the auction changing depending on the progress of the bidding. The FCC increases the number of rounds and decreases the length to goose the auction when bidding slows.

The FCC is opening up midband spectrum in the 2.5 GHz band for 5G. It is currently used, the FCC says underused, by educational broadband services (EBS).

EBS, formerly Instructional Television Fixed Service, or ITFS, was used in the 1960s for closed-circuit broadcasts to educational institutions, but was rebooted in the early 2000s and pointed toward broadband.

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The FCC has eliminated use requirements and leasing restrictions on the band.

It also created an early local priority window for tribal nations that drew over 400 applications. ■

The FCC has proposed $47 million in fines on 10 entities it alleges failed to provide the educational service required for the EBS spectrum (2.5 GHz) they had FCC licenses to use for that purpose.

They also allegedly did not create the local program committees they were required to use to advise them on use of their licenses.

Under their licenses, the entities were also required to set aside "a minimum of 5% of their capacity for educational use [and] provide at least 20 hours of educational programing per channel per week."

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The FCC said that they failed to meet those "fundamental" standards, sub-leasing the spectrum but not making sure those obligations were met to "support the education of students in their communities of license."

“Our actions underline the Commission’s ongoing expectation that all FCC licensees must meet their commitments to the American public,” said Enforcement Bureau chief Rosemary Harold. “These parties apparently profited from their licenses without also providing measurable and verifiable support for the educational goals that EBS licenses were designed to serve.  Disregard for license obligations is unacceptable.”

The FCC has since changed the 2.5 GHz obligations as it makes the band available for 5G, but all the companies got their licenses under the old rules.

The fines are only proposed and the entities have a chance to challenge them.

Those entities, and the proposed fines for each, are:

• Clarendon Foundation, Inc. – $3,346,000 (NAL)
• Hispanic Information and Telecommunications Network – $14,013,000 (NAL)
• National Conference on Citizenship – $1,590,000 (NAL)
• North American Catholic Educational Programming Foundation – $8,268,000 (NAL)
• Northern Arizona University Foundation – $5,485,000 (NAL)
• Rockne Educational Television, Inc. and The Learning Paradigm, Inc. – $3,975,000 (NAL)
• Shekinah Network – $6,377,500 (NAL)
• Views on Learning, Inc. – $2,745,000 (NAL)
• Voqal USA – $1,749,000 (NAL)

Some Democratic members of the House Task Force on Rural Broadband., led by Majority Whip James Clyburn, have called on the FCC to reverse its decision to elimate the educational broadband service (EBS) designation of the 2.5 GHZ band. 

That came in a letter to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai.

A politically divided FCC voted earlier this month to convert the 2.5 GHz band from one reserved for EBS licenses to flexible licenses that can be used for 5G, and to auction currently unassigned spectrum (white spaces) in the band. 

Clyburn and a quartet of other Dems expressed their "strong disapproval" of the FCC  

“Too many communities across the country are in digital desserts and the rural areas that do have access to high speed internet, the service is often unreliable, unaffordable, and too slow,” said Clyburn. “EBS provides millions of rural Americans access to the internet and the FCC’s decision to eliminate education requirements for EBS only exacerbates the rural-urban digital divide. High-speed internet access is essential to education, health care and employment in rural communities. Without connectivity, rural households will continue to be left behind.” 

Broadband access advocacy runs in the family. Clyburn is the father of former FCC commissioner and chair Mignon Clyburn, for whom closing the digital divide was a prime directive.