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IPFS News Link • Communications

FCC approves 'historic' plan to let broadband providers and military share spectrum

• theverge.com

"Since they don't make spectrum anymore, and since spectrum is the pathway of the 21st century, we have to figure out how we're going to live with a fixed amount," said FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said during Friday's session. "Sharing is key to that." The Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) plan — yes, that's a mouthful — will open frequencies from 3550MHz to 3700MHz to commercial companies; right now, they're mostly being used by radar systems belonging to the US Army and Navy.

These airwaves don't travel very fall or provide strong wall penetration, and it'll likely be years before your smartphone can harness them. But eventually, they could be used to bolster small cell deployments, LTE hotspots, and other applications that companies haven't figured out yet. Wheeler spoke of the benefits of the FCC's "historic" shared approach last month in a blog post. At that time, he said:


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