With the gross proceeds from the FCC's latest high-band spectrum (Spectrum Frontiers) auction showing little round-to-round increases, the FCC has taken another step to goose bidding and speed the auction of spectrum for 5G.

Starting Wednesday (Jan. 29), the FCC is increasing the number of rounds from five to seven, and shortening the rounds from 30 minutes to 20.

At press time, the gross bidding total was $7,560,741,954, up only a few million in the last 16 rounds from $7,519,663,706 after round 80.

On Jan. 23, the FCC boosted the required bid increase per round from 10% to 15% in an effort to boost bidding.

The 35 qualified bidders in the auction are competing for a whopping 3,400 MHz of millimeter-wave spectrum (in the Upper 37 GHz, 39 GHz, and 47 GHz bands), the most spectrum the FCC has ever offered in an auction of any type. The spectrum can be used for both fixed and mobile broadband and is being auctioned in 100 MHz blocks in partial economic areas (PEAs).

After the initial auction, there will be a follow-on auction among any of the license winners who want specific frequencies.

The most recent high-band ("spectrum frontiers" branded) auction, which ended last May raised $2,024,268,941 in gross proceeds after 91 rounds, but that was for approximately 700 MHz. 

As the FCC prepares to suspend its high-band,so-called "spectrum frontiers," spectrum auction (auction 103) for the holidays, bidders have pushed the gross take for the auction above $5 billion. That is after 24 rounds of bidding, which suspends Friday (Dec. 20) and restarts Monday, Jan. 6. 

The gross proceeds total so far is $5,360,806,992, with two more rounds to go before the break. 

The FCC is auctioning a whopping 3,400 MHz, the most ever spectrum in one auction, of millimeter-wave spectrum (in the Upper 37 GHz, 39 GHz, and 47 GHz bands). The spectrum can be used for both fixed and mobile broadband and is being auctioned in 100 MHz blocks in partial economic areas (PEAs).  

The most recent high-band, spectrum frontier, auction, which ended last May raised $2,024,268,941 in gross proceeds after 91 rounds, but that was for approximately 700 MHz. 

The FCC did not say it would be increasing the number of rounds when the auction resumes, but did remind bidders to view announcements regularly for any bidding schedule changes. 

Currently the bidding has been robust, but if it slows, the FCC will likely increase the number of rounds and possibly shorten them to a half hour.

The FCC should continue freeing up high-band spectrum for next-generation 5G mobile broadband rather than control the standards-setting process, and local governments should help streamline the deployment of new infrastructure.

Those are the key policy takeaways from a new report being released Thursday (June 30) by the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation.

Policymakers on every level of the government should aim to make infrastructure deployment as efficient as possible to see the flourishing of 5G networks," said report author Doug Brake, a telecom policy analyst with ITIF.

"Given the fact that many of the technological components of 5G are still in flux, that deployment scenarios are still being explored, and that there is still a good deal of gas in the LTE tank, government action around 5G should be more stage setting than full industrial policymaking," Brake said in the report. "There is certainly a role for government in encouraging 5G to flourish, but industry-led standard setting better allows discovery of new technologies and a more nuanced understanding of what areas are most economical to explore."

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Brake said that given the explosion of data traffic, particularly bandwidth-hungry video, speeds will have to increase if wireless is to be a more robust competitor to wireline. For that to happen, wireless only has a few levers to pull. Finding more spectrum is one, another is increasing capacity by improving spectrum efficacy.

But he says there are limits to increasing that efficiency and network engineers are close to butting up against them. "As hard as getting Congress to pass a new law can be, bending the laws of physics is even harder. There are also trade-offs in any system designed—a protocol designed purely for maximizing throughput may not handle other usage scenarios as well," he said.

Brake gives the FCC high marks for 5G stage-setting so far. "The FCC deserves credit for moving quickly to get high-band spectrum into the hands of innovators, and for not being beholden to international bodies, such as the ITU, who are slow to allocate this spectrum to mobile," he said.

The FCC has set aside 30 MHz of low-band spectrum in the broadcast incentive auction that can potentially be auctioned to competitive carriers at discount prices. But Brake cautions against that model for high-band spectrum.

"Regulators should exercise caution in setting reserve prices or payments when it comes to auctioning high-band spectrum. Unnecessarily high auction prices discourage investment in new, unproven technologies that will have significant deployment costs of their own."