Sharing Plan Complicates WRC
By Caron Carlson -- Wireless Week, 11/24/1997
WASHINGTON--In the final days of the 1997 World Radiocommunications Conference in Geneva, Switzerland, last week, delegates haggled over frequency-sharing arrangements for geostationary and non-geostationary satellite systems in the Ka and Ku bands.
The sharing proposal, advanced by European delegates, was used as a bargaining chip against a U.S. proposal to allocate an additional 100 megahertz to non-geostationary Ka-band constellations, namely Teledesic Corp.'s broadband low-earth orbit system. In pre-conference discussions last month, European delegates suggested they would not only resist the U.S. proposal but possibly seek to reverse the earlier allocation if a sharing plan were not agreed to.
Details regarding the negotiations flowed slowly from the conference after U.S. leadership placed a gag order on the delegation. FCC Commissioner Susan Ness, who attended the conference last week, would not be free to discuss the proposals until the negotiations concluded, said David Siddall, Ness' legal advisor.
Siddall said he does not know whether any precedent exists for a gag order at the WRC, but the tactic is not uncommon in other international negotiating arenas. "At the World Trade Organization discussions, people were not talking outside of their circles," he said.
The gag order stemmed from concerns that public discussions by delegates could undermine the United States' negotiating position, Siddall said. Although differences within the U.S. delegation had surfaced during the conference, such division did not necessarily induce the order, he said. "It wouldn't be news to me that different companies have different interests. However, either the delegates have to support the U.S. position or [not be part of it]."
An industry source said the sharing plan rests on provisional power limits on non-geostationary systems in the Ka and Ku bands. The power limits would be reviewed at the next WRC in 1999.
Negotiations did not appear as heated for other LEO system proposals. While the big LEOs were confident of receiving an additional allocation of 100 megahertz, the little LEOs may be losing the battle for an additional 1 megahertz, another industry source said.
