Carriers attack Martin over ‘Google block’ auction

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin’s comments in USA Today advocating open-access usage of license in the upcoming 700 MHz auction didn’t go unnoticed. Today Verizon Wireless, CTIA and even conservative political activists went after the Republican head of the commission, accusing him of cozying up with the Internet content industry, particularly search giant Google, which has pushed strongly for open-access rules.

Verizon Wireless vice president and general counsel Steve Zipperstein testified before the U.S. House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, urging Congress to ignore Google and other Internet companies’ calls for open-access requirements to the 700 MHz bands, which are scheduled for auction in early 2008. Zipperstein said the results of such rules would favor the Internet companies over the wireless industry, effectively pre-determining the winners of the auctions in advance.

“The wireless industry has produced a steady stream of innovations -- from devices, to applications, to features -- that have given American consumers myriad choices about how they use their wireless service,” said Zipperstein in a statement. “Consumer choice would be the casualty of policies that mandate that all companies do the same thing the same way.”

CTIA President and CEO Steve Largent called the proposed rules “Silicon Valley welfare.”

“Crafting special rules for a company with a market cap of $170 billion to address problems that don’t exist in our competitive market makes absolutely no sense whatsoever,” Largent said in a statement.

Even the American Conservative Union took shots at Martin, saying the businesses and the free market should determine how wireless spectrum is used, not regulators.

Draft rules for the auction call for a portion of the 60 MHz of spectrum on the block to be used for open-access, meaning other service providers beyond the license holder will be allowed to provide services over it, similar to the way the wireline Internet access is sold today. Such a plan would benefit companies like Google and eBay, both of which applauded Martin’s comments, as today they have to play by the wireless carrier’s rules to put their services over the cellular airwaves. The proposed rules, however, stop short of requiring license-holders to adopt wholesale models for spectrum, an approach Sprint has adopted with its new WiMAX network.