Matt Daneman

The FCC's 2-2 deadlock, Commissioner Brendan Carr's dance moves and the agency's expiring spectrum auction authorization caught darts from FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in her address Thursday night at the FCBA annual dinner. A crowd of close to 1,500 attended the event at the Marriott Marquis in Washington -- the first such in-person "telecom prom" since 2019. Being the first woman to deliver the chair's traditional monologue, Rosenworcel quipped she "will receive only 83% as much laughter." She made multiple jokes about the 2-2 commission, likening it to a World Cup score and, pointing to next congressional session's Senate, said "getting a one-vote majority sounds pretty good to me." With the FCC's spectrum auction authorization expiring, she said she would have some 4.9 GHz band spectrum available directly after her speech. Showing a video clip of Carr doing "the floss" dance move, Rosenworcel joked there are "ulterior reasons Brendan doesn't want people looking at TikTok." She also took jabs at such targets as Amazon, the AT&T/Time Warner combination, local news broadcasts and Communications Daily's new sister publication, Communication Litigation Today.

Notable changes in how the FCC handles satellite license applications seem likely due to efforts within the agency and congressional pressure on it, but timing is up in the air, space regulatory practitioners said. The Satellite and Telecommunications Streamlining Act introduced earlier this month (see 2212090064) isn't going anywhere in the remaining lame-duck session of Congress but stands good chances of being reintroduced and making progress in the next, we were told. Introducing it now was "a stake in the ground," and now staff can get feedback that could lead to amendments to it in the next session, said Hogan Lovells space lawyer George John.

The 3rd Generation Partnership Project's Release 17 earlier this spring opens the door to commercial satellite communications' role in 5G, and Release 18 should open it far wider, enabling far more applications and broader merging of satellite with terrestrial 5G networks, satellite industry executives said Thursday. It's less clear how long Release 18 could take, said Gilat Vice President-Products Gil Elizov at a GVF webinar. Many see a widespread satcom role in 5G being years out (see 2205180003).

Astronomers and allies view the FCC's partial approval/partial deferral on SpaceX's second-generation satellite system plans (see 2212010052) as a mixed bag, with questionable ability to tackle light pollution worries raised by the mega constellation. They said the agency's order acknowledges concerns, but it's unclear what the commission can or would do if even the scaled-down deployment the agency OK'd causes significant astronomical observation or environmental problems. SpaceX didn't comment.

The American Data Privacy and Protection Act still has a chance -- albeit a slim one -- of passing during the lame-duck congressional session, privacy experts said Wednesday at a Broadband Breakfast panel. Without comprehensive federal legislation, expect an ongoing wave of states crafting their own privacy rules, said R Street Institute's Brandon Pugh.

2021 was a robust year for space venture capital, but 2022 has a "more challenging environment," with VC investment trending downward quarter after quarter, said Maureen Haverty, Seraphim Space vice president-investment, in a Space Tech Expo webinar Tuesday. She said early-stage and seed-stage investing are "holding on pretty well," but growth investment is taking a hit. She said deals in growth investment are faring better in the U.S. than in Europe, which doesn't have a strong growth investment scene in space anyway, while the U.S. investment community has more risk tolerance. Haverty said growth investors have traditionally focused on revenue and profitability, but 2021 was an anomaly where investors were more liberal in their standards. "Now the standards have returned," and companies seeking VC investment need to focus on revenue and profitability, she said. Ali Baghchehsara, president of space propulsion startup Plasmos, said the investment environment will likely remain more challenging for a while. He said for companies seeking funding, the focus needs to be on having a simple story and on achieving milestones to demonstrate progress.

Trying to ensure that broadband, equity, access and deployment program money doesn't end up paying for overbuilding of existing broadband networks is a big cable priority, industry and company officials told us. ACA Connects' advocacy, which has focused on NTIA, will increasingly turn toward states in coming weeks as they lay out their challenge processes to, and seek OK from, NTIA, said Vice President-Regulatory Affairs Mike Jacobs.

Having heard the spectrum and regulatory needs of in-space servicing, assembly and manufacturing companies, the FCC now needs to move quickly on an NPRM to address them, ISAM operators said in docket 22-271 reply comments Tuesday. The commission received comments last month in its notice of inquiry about ways to aid nascent ISAM operations (see 2211010025). NTIA said it and federal agencies "support and commend" FCC efforts toward ensuring ISAM industry activities have access to spectrum and helping drive ISAM growth.

The slew of space-related special-purpose acquisition company transactions has slowed to a trickle and isn't likely to pick back up soon, space investment experts told us. Some space companies remain bullish on SPACs as the best route to an initial public offering, Qulty Analytics analyst Caleb Henry said, citing Intuitive Machines, which in September announced a SPAC deal. The space infrastructure company said it expects to go public in Q1 2023.

National competition going on now to dominate in-space manufacturing and for asteroid and lunar resources will determine what nation is likely to dominate the balance of power there for the next century, said American Foreign Policy Council Senior Fellow Peter Garretson at a Hudson Institute event Tuesday. "This is not some piece of policy to be left for later," Garretson said. He said, along with dominating space commodity production and space infrastructure, the U.S. needs to ensure as many partners as possible are using that infrastructure system. The U.S. and China will likely be the main rivals for space dominance, with India being a later arrival, Garretson said. He said Russia, France and Germany will likely follow the norms established by those space powers. The U.S.' lack of a national plan to develop space-based solar energy generation is "negligent and irresponsible," especially given how numerous other nations, including China and various U.S. allies, have their own space solar programs. Other Congressional space priorities also should include making commercial development of space a national policy, Garretson said. He said the national cislunar strategy put out last week by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy references economic development multiple times; commercial development isn't part of the national space policy or in NASA's charter; and it's unclear whether Commerce or NASA would be the lead in those commercial development efforts. Congress also needs to accelerate development of space infrastructure perhaps through designating a public corporation to finance and build that infrastructure, and create space infrastructure bonds, Garretson said. There also should be a space commodities exchange and space commodities futures exchange, he said. The estimated value of mineral resources in the solar system "is truly vast" and easily dwarfs projections of the space economy being anywhere from $1 trillion to $3 trillion by 2040, Garretson said.