Apple is urging regulators to include more unlicensed spectrum bands in their plans while the FCC is taking comments about how it should treat the “super-high” spectrum bands, reports FierceWireless. The tech giant suggests that a higher proportion of unlicensed spectrum could be achieved through sharing with licensed services.
“Apple supports the Commission’s vision for the bands above GHz and appreciates its continued efforts to move away from prescriptive spectrum regulations,” Apple says. “The Commission should consider, however, the likelihood that the proposed allocation structure will have precisely the effect it hoped to avoid: precluding some technologies and services, including some that are already being considered in international proceedings.”
Apple wants the FCC to establish larger unlicensed bandwidths. So far, the proposed unlicensed bands range from 1 gigahertz to 7.2 gigahertz wide. Those are too narrow to enable optimal use of the type of technologies that are being developed today, according to FierceWireless.
The ETSI and the Electronic Communications Committee of the European Conference of Post and Telecommunications Administrations are working to advance new short-range radiodetermination applications that would operate between 120 GHz and 260 GHz and would require bandwidths of 20 gigahertz or more to function optimally. Existing forms of this kind of technology are central to various industries, including environmental protection, human safety and manufacturing, Apple said in a filing. Providing room to develop these technologies at higher frequencies with larger bandwidths has the potential to significantly improve the fidelity of these technologies, supporting applications that are feasible today, the company said.
Likewise, the ITU has started studying the use of spectrum between 275 GHz and 450 GHz for high-speed, short-range communications technologies, which would also depend on sufficient spectrum for very wide bandwidth operations.
“Therefore, while it is true that this spectrum is largely a ‘blank slate’ today, there are already concrete examples of likely uses for these bands that should be considered in the commission’s decision-making,” Apple said in its filing.
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