Fred Campbell, WCAI, on fixed wireless and where cable fits

Fred Campbell, President, Wireless Communications Association International (WCAI)

It would be an overstatement to say that Fred Campbell, president of the Wireless Communications Association International (WCAI) has a keen interest in this week's Cable Show. On the other hand, it would be an understatement to say he's uninterested in what the wireline community is doing. As president of what is generally considered the international organization for fixed wireless operators, Campbell counts some cable operators among his members, so he has more than a passing interest in all things cable.

Campbell sat down recently for a brief conversation with FierceCable editor Jim Barthold.

Jim Barthold: Probably the best way to start this conversation is to have you define WCAI.

Fred Campbell: We are both a mobile and fixed wireless association (but) we still believe there's a lot of life left in the fixed wireless space.

JB: From a cable perspective that means Clearwire (Nasdaq: CLWR) and, to a lesser extent, LightSquared. Both companies are members--along with Time Warner Cable (NYSE: TWC). Doesn't that make things a little interesting when it comes to competing interests?

FC: With any membership organization you have a mix of players that creates an interesting mix of possibilities. Clearwire has its own retail operation so I suppose it's possible they could provide service using LightSquared's network as well, although I have no idea if that would ever come to pass. Time Warner is a member because of their wireless interests with Clearwire and I think they like to keep on top of the policy issues surrounding their wireless service.

"I view cable at this point as more of a client of networks like Clearwire than a competitor."

JB: We'll get to those policies issues in a moment, but first, what's the general interest of cable in WCAI--and the reverse?

FC: I view cable at this point as more of a client of networks like Clearwire than a competitor. It seems like the cable players don't want to be network managers on the wireless side--at least at this time.

JB: If cable ever decided to get into the wireless business, would this be an opportunity for some of your members to sell or wholesale their spectrum?

FC: One thing the fixed wireless guys are encountering with the rise of Internet data is congestion. The question is how to carry the YouTubes of the world using spectrum, because spectrum is a relatively constrained resource. That congestion issue may be an opportunity for a partnership with the cable providers.

Wireless obviously provides some capabilities that wired can't but it hasn't been clear to us that wireless will ever be able to provide the kind of capacity that you see on the wired side. They're going to be competitive and complementary services and to the extent that they're complementary services I think partnership opportunities may make some sense.

JB: Now back to the policy issues. You touched on spectrum. Where do you stand on the whole National Broadband Plan 'find spectrum anywhere you can' issue that's floating around D.C. these days?

FC: We're supportive of incentive auction legislation. There are some opportunities for fixed wireless in some bands that everybody thinks of as mobile bands. One of those bands is 700 (MHz). It's quite possible in some of the more rural areas the RLECs and some others will use their 700 MHz spectrum for fixed data in areas that remain particularly had to serve.

JB: Many broadcasters have resisted giving up more spectrum and some have even pointed to one of your members, Time Warner Cable, as sitting on a swath of spectrum that it should give up before they go reaching into the broadcasters' pockets again.

"The advocates of 'Oh, you're sitting on spectrum and you can be more efficient by transitioning your other networks' are actually trying to have it both ways."

FC: I think that's a short-sighted view of the wireless world. A year ago the carriers were faced with the choice of whether to deploy a 3G network on this spectrum and proliferate handsets for that spectrum using 3G technology (while) knowing that LTE will be more viable in the next two to three years. Why not wait to deploy LTE? From an economic standpoint and a spectrum efficiency standpoint it's much smarter to wait until 4G LTE is ready to go than to be shortsighted, spend a ton of money putting in a 3G network, get handsets into millions of consumers' hands and create yet another transition problem for yourself.

The advocates of 'Oh, you're sitting on spectrum and you can be more efficient by transitioning your other networks' are actually trying to have it both ways.

JB: All true, but isn't it better if you're not going to use the spectrum to sell it?

FC: I'm not sure it makes any sense for them to sit on it for any lengthy period of time. I do think the markets tend to correct. If they're not going to build their own infrastructure, why sit on a valuable asset that you can immediately monetize?

JB: As we concluded at the beginning, you're the organization for fixed wireless providers. Really, with mobile wireless seemingly dominating everywhere, how much life is left in fixed wireless?

FC: We still do cater to the fixed market. We sort of straddle the line between unlicensed fixed and licensed fixed and we also straddle the line between fixed and mobile, which puts us in something of a unique position, especially for a lot of our smaller members who are either in transitions to mobile or using licensed for fixed and continue to want to do so.

JB: But won't mobile eventually rule?

FC: Some of those issues need to be sorted out because some are looking at mobile and haven't really made final decisions on business models and technologies. I know some of the members who hold 2.5 GHz spectrum are looking at making their networks compatible with Clearwire and relying on roaming agreements. That's one mobile play. Another question is whether they go to LTE. Some of them hold 2.5 and we have members who hold 700 MHz. do they do dual networks, LTE and WiMAX? Do they bet on one or the other? They have some interesting questions ahead of them and I think there's enough flux there right now that some of them won't move quickly and will just continue to be fixed operators with profitable businesses in that space. There may not be a real rush for them to transition.