Update on Broadcast Spectrum Incentive Auctions

Lynn Claudy

The Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2012, at 102 pages long, is not exactly easy reading1. Several of those pages, however, are incredibly important to the future of U.S. broadcasters' continued use of RF spectrum and well worth understanding, making up what is referred to as the 2012 Spectrum Act. Section 6402 changed the existing law on spectrum auctions, allowing for the first time for revenues from spectrum auctions to be shared as an incentive with incumbent spectrum users (hence the term incentive auction). Section 6403 then sets rules about how to conduct such an incentive auction in the specific case of broadcast spectrum. Since the law's effective date of 22 February 2012, a bevy of workshops, panels, and discussions have taken place, along with a number of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) official actions and thousands of pages filed by industry and other stakeholders in response to those actions, with much more to come. The sheer weight and complexity of the process have already taken a toll on the schedule. With the incentive auctions originally planned to take place in 2014, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, having been in that role barely a month, announced in December 2013 that the target date for conducting the auction would be delayed until the middle of 2015. The launching of spectrum incentive auctions will not be easy, but it is coming, with permission already given by Congress and the FCC leading the charge via its proceeding in docket number 12–268.

Print ISSN
Electronic ISSN
2160-2492
Published
2014-09
Content type
Original Research
DOI
10.5594/j18450