In The News

In The News | Philadelphia Inquirer | Marcela M. Gomez | February 10, 2017

Spectrum Sharing a Way to Keep Philly on Cutting Edge

Commentary by Marcela M. Gomez

“One interested party, Ligado Networks, has submitted a proposal to the FCC to share the spectrum band with NOAA – not to change the data being transmitted, but to distribute the data more efficiently and effectively. The proposal has slowed because of pushback from NOAA and some members of the weather enterprise, who currently receive data for free, citing the threat of interference to the activities of NOAA’s latest weather satellite, the GOES-R, which was launched just before Thanksgiving. However, evidence suggests that negotiation could move the parties to a win-win outcome. Ligado Networks has offered to establish protection zones around NOAA facilities to manage interference and has volunteered a requirement to augment NOAA data distribution with content-delivery network (CDN). A CDN would provide access to NOAA’s information for many more universities and public partners than currently use it. These conditions could be a required provision for any spectrum auction winner that wants to share NOAA’s spectrum.”

Read the full op-ed at the Philadelphia Inquirer.