FSCJ Spectrum Information Memorandum Page 7 of 11 Attachment 1 to FSCJ ITN #2014-33 EDUCATIONAL BROADBAND SERVICE SPECTRUM INFORMATION MEMORANDUM: JACKSONVILLE, FL AND ENVIRONS April 30, 2014 Robert Finch 820 Great Cumberland Road McLean, VA 22102 Copyright 2013 Select Spectrum LLC
FSCJ Spectrum Information Memorandum Page 8 of 11 INTRODUCTION This Spectrum Information Memorandum SIM has been prepared by Select Spectrum on behalf of Florida State College, Jacksonville. FSCJ holds two FCC Educational Broadband Service EBS spectrum licenses which are being offered for lease. This document provides a brief description of the opportunity and relevant information about the licenses and covered area. Additional background on 2.5 GHz spectrum, wireless technologies and rules governing spectrum use may be found on Select Spectrum s website at http://selectspectrum.com and http://wireless.fcc.gov/services/index.htm?job=service_home&id=ebs_brs. Any interested party may also contact Select Spectrum and request more detailed information about the FSCJ spectrum licenses, use of the spectrum or the planned leasing process. FSCJ SPECTRUM LICENSES AVAILABLE FOR LEASE FSCJ s offering of its call signs WHA933 and WND518 for lease 1 presents a unique opportunity for the following reasons: The FSCJ frequencies provide 22.5 MHz overall capacity and are compatible with Mobile 4G technologies including WiMAX 2 and LTE 3 as well as with fixed wireless multipoint, point-to-point and video transmission systems. All regulatory and substantial service requirements have been met. An entity may lease the spectrum now for current or future use without any immediate requirement to build a network. The renewal dates for the FCC licenses are 7/29/2017 (WHA933) and 6/30/2019 (WND518) when the licenses are due for renewal. As shown on the map on the following page, WHA933 and WND518 offer broad coverage of the Jacksonville metro area. In total, the licenses cover over 1.3 million POPs and 28.2 million MHz POPs. Of these 1.3 million MHz POPs (81,600 POPs x 16.5 MHz) in areas north and west of Duval County have been leased to MSB Spectrum Holdings. FSCJ is offering to lease 22.5 MHz of available spectrum covering all of Duvall County (red area of map below) including the city and suburbs of Jacksonville and counties to the south and east 4 a total of 27.5 million MHz-POPs. FSCJ is also offering to lease 6 MHz in the counties to the north and west of Duval that cover the same area previously leased to MSB Spectrum (81,600 POPs x 6 MHz = 490,000 MHz POPs). In addition, approximately 8,900 people in the southwest portion of the license (purple area) are 1 The proposed lease must meet all FCC requirements including a maximum term not to exceed 30 years and the requirement that five percent of the capacity of the license must be reserved for educational use 2 WiMAX is the common name for Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access as governed by the WiMAX forum http://wimaxforum.org 3 LTE stands for Long Term Evolution and is a 4 th generation standard developed by 3GPP for the mobile wireless industry including companies such as AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint. 4 As shown in the map, a small portion of the licensed area in the western portion of the coverage includes only 16.5, not 22.5 MHz.
FSCJ Spectrum Information Memorandum Page 9 of 11 covered on the C1-C3 channels (16.5 MHz) and this spectrum is also available. A total of 28.1 million MHz POPs are available for lease. 5 Map 1: Spectrum Coverage and Depth of Spectrum Available for Lease Coverage POPs MHz POPS 6 MHz 81,608 489,649 16.5 MHz 8,890 146,688 22.5 MHz 1,219,463 27,437,921 5 Select Spectrum has prepared this document and believes the information presented to be reliable, but each interested party bears its own responsibility for verifying and evaluating all relevant information about the spectrum licenses. Neither Select Spectrum nor Florida State College Jacksonville makes any warranty about the information presented herein.
FSCJ Spectrum Information Memorandum Page 10 of 11 Select Spectrum believes that any entity interested in leasing spectrum from FSCJ may also be able to arrange a sublease or lease assignment from Spectrum Holdings Inc. Select Spectrum will provide contact information for MSB Spectrum Holdings to interested parties. BASIC INFORMATION ABOUT 2.5 GHz EBS SPECTRUM The 2.5 GHz band is divided into two radio services, EBS and Broadband Radio Service BRS. Approximately 40% of the band has been licensed and auctioned to commercial carriers as BRS spectrum, while the other 60% was allocated to educational institutions as EBS spectrum. Originally the FCC s plan was to develop the 2.5 GHz band for educational television broadcasts and distance learning applications. There were 2,244 active EBS licenses as of 11/12/13. In 2005, the FCC approved changes to their rules to allow the use of this BRS and EBS licenses for two-way, mobile and fixed data services including Internet access. FCC regulations allow EBS licensees to lease their spectrum rights for uses including commercial wireless Internet access, either mobile or fixed, and the majority of the spectrum capacity of most of these licenses has been leased to commercial wireless operators. 4G protocols, including WIMAX and LTE, are supported by a wide variety of equipment manufacturers. The spectrum can also be used to support more specialized networks including utility smart grid applications, government organizations and public safety 6, etc. A limited portion of the spectrum must also be used for educational purposes, and spectrum leases generally require commercial lessees to provide support for specified educational use of the license. Cisco forecasts data usage growth of 66 percent compounded annually between 2012 and 2017. 7 Data use is being driven by increasing use of large mobile phones/phablets and tablets with high definition screens. As mobile devices are used increasingly for applications like watching video in addition to more traditional applications like sending and receiving email, mobile carriers need more spectrum to support the rapid growth of demand for wireless data. BASIC INFORMATION ABOUT THE JACKSONVILLE MARKET The Jacksonville Metro area includes 1.378 million (2010 census) residents and from 2010-2012 grew by 2.4 percent. The diverse economy of the area includes major military, transportation, financial services, and tourism sectors. Florida State government remains pro-business and progrowth and provides an excellent foundation on which to launch or expand a business. Jacksonville s balanced economy will likely achieve steady growth. 6 NYCWIN is a post 9/11 public safety network in New York that utilizes leased 2.5 GHz spectrum licenses to provide mobile wireless broadband access for a variety of municipal organizations. See http://www.nyc.gov/html/doitt/html/citywide/nycwin.shtml 7 http://www.cisco.com/en/us/solutions/collateral/ns341/ns525/ns537/ns705/ns827/white_paper_c11-520862.html
FSCJ Spectrum Information Memorandum Page 11 of 11 2.5 GHz spectrum is an ideal, low cost licensed basis for wireless solutions to serve this market. Capacity is high, spectrum and equipment costs are low due to high volume in US and Asian markets. Jacksonville topography is generally level and foliage is moderate minimizing radio frequency losses associated with hills and forests. While lower frequency bands do allow for larger cells, urban areas benefit from the moderate propagation distance and cell sizes included in typical 2.5 GHz systems which support a high volume of traffic across the network.