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The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC)’s comment period on a rulemaking petition by geolocation provider NextNav, Inc., to reconfigure the 902-928 MHz unlicensed band and adopt new rules to enable the deployment of a 5G positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) network has ended with hundreds of comments opposing the proposal. This midband spectrum is widely used by a broad swath of IoT, industrial, smart metering, retail, traffic, security, and other applications, and is allocated on a primary basis to federal radiolocation systems and industrial, scientific, and medical (ISM) equipment.
With this petition NextNav is requesting priority for their GPS-based devices in the 902-928 MHz band traditionally used by UHF RFID, LoRa, and other technologies. Licensed devices operating in this spectrum are currently required to coexist with Part 15 unlicensed devices, a federal regulation that sets limitations on the amount of electromagnetic interference allowed from digital and electronic devices, as well as many types of unlicensed radios, with lack of interference validated through field testing. Opponents believe that the new petition will threaten and/or eliminate these protections for the billions of Part 15 devices currently in operation.
The US Chamber of Commerce has declared its opposition to the petition in a response with dozens of industry signatories ranging from the National Association of Manufacturers to transportation infrastructure associations and the LoRa Alliance. Among other concerns, the LoRa Alliance, which also issued its own oppositional response, contends that NextNav’s petition would limit LoRaWAN operations to 60% of the available band, causing unacceptable levels of interference to many LoRaWAN systems and operations.
September 20th is the deadline for replies to the comments received.
Find out more about the market outlook for Industrial RFID and related technologies.