Telecom Business Alert – Incentive Auction Update; Foreign Ownership Enforcement; Robocalls; FirstNet Resolutions, Vol XIII, Issue 27

Incentive Auction Update

Last week the initial stage of the FCC’s broadcast incentive auction ended after 52 rounds and the Commission established a clearing cost of $86.4 billion for repurposing 126 MHz of licensed and unlicensed spectrum for wireless data use.  In a blog post, the Chair and Vice-Chair of the Incentive Auction Task Force announced that a list of qualified bidders will be released in mid-July as well as user guides for the forward auction bidding system.  

Foreign Ownership Enforcement

The FCC announced that Puerto Rico Telephone Company (PRTC) and its parent company América Móvil will pay $1.1 million to resolve an investigation by the Enforcement Bureau.  The Bureau found that PRTC and its parent exceeded their approved foreign ownership three times in five years.  In addition, PRTC and its parent agreed to adopt compliance plans and implement monitoring of compliance with the rules governing foreign ownership.  For more information, please contact Wes Wright (wright@khlaw.com; 202.434.4239).

Robocalls

A federal court in West Virginia recently held in Mey v. Got Warranty, Inc. et al that a consumer who sued two companies for making autodialed telemarketing calls (“robocalls”) to her cell phone in violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) suffered concrete and particularized injuries sufficient to support standing under the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins,and can proceed with her lawsuit.  Among other things, the TCPA prohibits robocalls to wireless numbers without consent and calls to numbers registered on the National Do Not Call Registry.  For more information, please contact Tracy Marshall (marshall@khlaw.com; 202.434.4234).   

FirstNet Resolutions

Last week the Board of Directors of the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) met in Chicago, Illinois and adopted resolutions approving a new five-year lease for its technical headquarters in Boulder, Colorado and updated the charter for the Public Safety Advisory Committee (PSAC).  FirstNet’s leadership also provided strategic guidance to position itself for a public-private partnership and eventual deployment of the network following the award of the contract, which remains on track for November 2016.  

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Keller and Heckman LLP's Telecom Business Alert is a complimentary weekly electronic update created by the Telecommunications and the Business Counseling and Transactional practice groups of Keller and Heckman LLP.  All articles, videos, and quotations are on topics of general interest and do not constitute legal advice for particularized facts.  Keller and Heckman LLP's Telecom Business Alert © 2015.  All rights reserved.  Articles may be copied with attribution.  To sign up for our weekly alert, please send us an email at telecomalert@khlaw.com and provide us with your name and email.  Please follow us on Twitter at @KHtelecom.