In November, 2015, Geneva, Switzerland will host a meeting that will prove pivotal in the future of global wireless communications.

What wireless services are available on which global frequencies are determined by the 1100 delegates from 193 Member States at the 2015 World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC), hosted every three to four years by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). This conference is little known outside specialist circles but the impact of its decisions will echo for years across wireless industries.

The history of globalized communication runs through this conference. The roots of the WRC are older than Canada. The ITU was established in May 1865, when its twenty founding members signed the first International Telegraph Convention in Paris. The first International Radiotelegraph Conference was held in Berlin in 1906.

We’ve moved well beyond telegraphy but the need for international cooperation and coordination in wireless remains. The WRC establishes the global priority of access to valuable radio frequencies. The future of everything from cell phones, to air traffic control, to satellites, to baby monitors is guided by decisions made at the WRC.

As an example of the WRC impact at home, in 2014, Canada auctioned off the 700 MHz frequencies, previously reserved for television broadcasting, netting the Canadian government over $5 billion. Similar auctions of the so-called “digital dividend” have been held around the world. In Canada, the “Big Three” wireless carriers – Rogers, Telus and Bell – have since launched fast LTE service on this band in various parts of the country. Canadian spectrum management company Loxcel Geomatics published the following numbers of 700 MHz cell phone towers providing this new service nation-wide as of May, 2015, one year after the auction:

Rogers            1,345

Telus                701

Bell                  690

This recent growth of mobile services on the 700 MHz band can be traced to the WRC 2007 decision to open those frequencies to International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT).

In a similar vein, the explosion in WiFi in the last decade owes some of its growth to the WRC 2003 decision to open up more spectrum for “mobile wireless access systems”. This allowed WiFi the capacity to grow and become the ubiquitous technology it is today. Clearly, decisions made at this relatively unknown conference are eventually felt in our day-to-day engagement with wireless communications.

The upcoming conference is anticipated to have significant impact on the wireless and TV broadcasting industries. According to the wireless industry journal Policy Tracker, WRC 2015 “will see a major shake up” of lower frequencies most coveted by wireless service providers (Policy Tracker, January 2015). Industries already occupying these frequencies, such as the remaining terrestrial television broadcasters (over the air and received by antenna) are questioning the feasibility of sharing spectrum with the growing wireless broadband industry. After WRC 2015, wireless growth may come at the expense of broadcasting.

The first agenda item for WRC 2015 is key for the future of broadcasting and wireless broadband:

1.1 to consider additional spectrum allocations to the mobile service on a primary basis and identification of additional frequency bands for International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT) and related regulatory provisions, to facilitate the development of terrestrial mobile broadband applications (International Telecommunication Union, 2012).

In short, item 1.1 seeks to make more spectrum available for the purpose of providing mobile broadband. In recent years, there have been claims from incumbent wireless operators that they are in dire need of more spectrum. However, these arguments are often disputed by others who use the spectrum, including those in the broadcasting and satellite industries. The future of these industries will be heavily impacted by this agenda item at WRC. Whether or not you are able to watch hockey games in HD on your cell phone or tablet will be influenced by spectrum allocation decisions made in Geneva in 2015.

The upcoming 2015 conference has had a lengthy development: the general scope was established four years ago and the agenda has been set for almost two years. Despite the years of preparation for this important conference, a great deal remains uncertain. Much of the information for WRC 2015 is publicly accessible, but not freely so. Access to national contributions to the conference requires a TIES (Telecommunication Information Exchange Service) account that costs 4000 Swiss francs, or over $5000 Canadian dollars. No Canadian academic institutions are currently affiliated with WRC 2015 but Canadian Spectrum Policy Research is aware of industry involvement in the Canadian preparatory meetings by leading wireless providers and hardware manufacturers.

WRC 2015 will have ripple effects for years to come in our wireless services. Faster mobile Internet speed and increased adoption of Wi-Fi are only two examples of this meeting’s historical impact. Major international bureaucracies do not move at fibre-optic speed and it will take some time to implement WRC 2015 decisions. Industry Canada’s current Canadian Table of Frequency Allocations was released in 2014 and is designed to reflect the decisions made at WRC 2012. The “new” spectrum being deployed for fast LTE coverage in Canada in 2015 is a direct result of WRC 2007. Bands allocated for mobile at WRC 2015 may take 5 to 10 years before they actually come into use (Policy Tracker, January 2015).

Though not nearly as splashy or well-reported as the launch of the newest Apple gizmo, if you wish to view our digital future, you may wish to pay attention to the WRC in Geneva next month.

Gregory Taylor

University of Calgary

Oct 27, 2015

 

Sources Cited:

Policy Tracker. (January 2015). WRC-15 Briefing: Key issues, areas of disagreement and likely outcomes.

Dr. Taylor spoke before the national media regulator on September 16 on the subject of the future of over-the-air television in Canada. He argued that Canadian OTA broadcasters are not making efficient use of their assigned 6 MHz of public spectrum and, as a result, Canadians are missing out on the true potential of digital OTA broadcasts. As the CRTC considers ending over-the-air transmission altogether, Taylor argues perhaps Canadians should first see what a true digital OTA system looks like. Transcript available here.

The Canadian Telecom Summit (CTS) is an annual industry conference focusing on the telecommunication, IT, and broadcasting industries. The conference brings together senior executives, along with policy makers, regulators, and industry analysts to discuss key issues and trends that will impact this critical sector of the Canadian economy. While government officials from various areas (including the CRTC, Industry Canada, Heritage, and the Prime Minister’s Office) often attend, they are not active presenters or panelists. Thus, the CTS serves as part of the regular, routine contacts between government and business that can influence policy decisions, along with facilitating communication between infrastructure manufacturers, business service providers, and carriers and internet service providers (ISPs).

For a researcher focused on spectrum policy, it was interesting to observe that very little of this year’s Canadian Telecom Summit put much emphasis on spectrum. It existed on the periphery but largely just as one of many factors that networks require to meet the growing bandwidth demands of mobile broadband. MTS’s CEO noted that the 700 MHz auction rules favoured national carriers at the expense of regional carriers in context of the Harper government’s 4th carrier policy. WIND Mobile’s CEO also talked about the need to get access to spectrum to roll out LTE but, once again, in the competition lens of a 4th national carrier.

The CTS is primarily an industry conference, so focused on current dynamics in the commercial/consumer sector. The 700 MHz auction wrapped up earlier this year (February) and the 2500 MHz auction is still 10 months away. The July 7th AWS-3 announcement by Industry Canada to hold another auction in-between appears to have genuinely caught industry watchers and participants by surprise. Even rumours of such a possibility were nowhere to be heard at CTS. So, understandably, spectrum availability was not of high priority — or at least debate/discussion — at the summit.

At the always lively ‘Regulatory Blockbuster’ panel, most of the debate took place around wholesale domestic roaming and network access issues — areas that the CRTC is currently considering. Whether panelists were incumbents (Rogers, Bell, TELUS), new entrants (WIND), or representing independent ISPs (Tacit), largely dictated their positions and speaking points. Failure of new entrants and startups to move up the investment ladder in facilities-based competition was highlighted by the incumbents. Speaking points for non-incumbents included regulated access for cablecos on incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) networks during their startup phase, Canada’s increasing underperformance in broadband speeds and price/value, and use of domestic roaming rates as an anti-competitive tactic.

From a policy analysis lens, this presents a few serious challenges. Power asymmetries between incumbents and challengers are emphasized when issues are dealt with on an individual basis and comprehensive sectoral policy is not reviewed. The more specificity is employed — the narrower the policy issue — the more it allows more powerful actors to make ‘reasonable’ arguments and extract more concessions. It also can result in satisficing by policy makers, meeting the minimum requirements for achieving a particular result without fully exploring/pursuing more optimal options.

On the issue of wholesale network access, Jonathan Daniels (VP, Regulatory Law, Bell) argued that unlike DSL internet-access, there was no legacy benefit to fibre to the home/node (FTTH/FTTN). Which is ‘reasonable’, since incumbents are deploying the FTTH connection for new customers only when requested for existing residences and businesses. But it also ignores incumbent right-of-way access and switching station facilities that are part of legacy copper line deployments.

Right-of-way access in this case refers to the ability of utility companies (ISPs, WSPs, telcos, and cablecos) to run network wires under and above ground on public and private land and have guaranteed access, necessary to build and maintain telecommunications infrastructure. Telecom companies that were originally telephone (or cable) companies often built their original networks as a monopoly, and have maintained right-of-way access sometimes for more than 100 years. To limit the amount of tearing up of roads and properties, governments will often mandate incumbents provide access to these ‘local loop’ or ‘last-mile’ connections/infrastructure.

Ted Woodhead (SVP, Federal Government & Regulatory Affairs, TELUS) argued that Industry Canada’s ‘changing of the rules’ around the transfer of AWS spectrum set-aside had negative consequences for investment. (Simon Lockie, Chief Regulatory Officer, WIND Mobile, suggested this was more a case of government clarifying, rather than changing, rules.) This may be true but this ‘changing of the rules’ impacts foreign investors more and, in fact, likely improves incumbents’ access to domestic capital markets.

Industry Canada’s Digital Canada 150 strategy — a document named for Canada’s age, not anywhere near the policy’s broadband speed targets — continues this satisficing policy making. Canada’s government policy is too narrowly focused on individual issues and not truly a roadmap to achieving the Telecommunication Act’s policy objectives in an ambitious and/or strategic manner.

In this regard, the ‘spectrum crunch’ argument made in the run up to the 700MHz auction appears to be even more a tactic by incumbent carriers to disaggregate telecommunication policy in order to maximize their asymmetric position in the sector — especially with the high-value, low-band spectrum available in that auction. Such behaviour by incumbents is both rational and justified to protect their corporate interests. And it is not solely directed towards new entrants. WIND’s Lockie noted in his CTS presentation several examples of inter-modal incumbent regulatory competition:

• Cost-based rates for access to support structures (poles, strands, ducts), duplication of which can be unsightly or disruptive for communities [cable company initiative opposed by ILECs];
• ILEC demands for fair access to Multiple Dwelling Units leading to the “MDU Condition” to promote choice for end-users [LECs v. cable co’s];
• Vertical Integration rules governing access to content held by integrated operators [content rich BDU’s v. content poor BDU’s].

Source: WIND Mobile. Regulatory Blockbuster Panel [Slide Deck]. 2014 Canadian Telecom Summit.

Rogers’ Ken Engelhart (SVP, Regulatory, Rogers Communications) argued the regulatory system should be about consumers and that government should remove barriers to competition but should not help individual competitors. The crux of his position was, “Incentives matter. Countries with high levels of wholesale regulation invest less and have second-class networks.” (Source: Rogers Communications, Regulatory Blockbuster Panel [Slide Deck]. 2014 Canadian Telecom Summit.)

The problem is that government should not be focused solely on investment levels, as this only tells part of the story. While Rogers, TELUS, and Bell all used examples of Europe vis-à-vis North America, data was selectively used and given with no context. Less investment could be the result of less duplication of infrastructure. “Second-class networks” is a euphemism for lack of LTE but this is more the result of greater challenges coordinating spectrum policy across individual countries, and a hangover the financial Euro crisis. Germany, one of the first EU countries to allot spectrum for LTE and with a strong economy, has comparable mobile download speeds and broad LTE network coverage.

It is up to government and regulators to be more holistic in policy development and weigh the benefits and costs to consumers and citizens more broadly.

CSPR’s primary investigator Gregory Taylor was nominated to the final five for his book, Shut Off: The Canadian Digital Television Transition (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2013). Shut Off examined the technology and policies involved with Canada’s switch from analogue to digital television broadcasting, which cleared the 700MHz band for 2014’s Mobile Broadband Services (MBS) spectrum auction.

The Donner Book Prize annually rewards excellence and innovation in public policy writing by Canadians.