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Satellite sector
calls on ACMA to
consider 5G band sharing
The satellite industry
has urged the Australian
Communications and Media
Authority to avoid
spectrum in the mmWave
range that it currently
uses, or plans to use,
when considering pioneer
bands for deploying 5G
mobile services in
Australia.
The ACMA is in the early
stages of investigating
which mmWave bands it
plans to allocate for 5G
in line with efforts by
the International
Telecommunications
Union’s so called “Task
Group 5/1”, which has
identified the 26GHz
band (24.25GHz to
27.5GHz) as a promising
candidate. However, some
portions of the 26GHz
band overlap with
high-throughput
satellite systems
operating domestically
and throughout the
region, and that has
motivated the satellite
industry to get involved
in discussions around
terrestrial 5G
deployment.
Speaking on behalf of
the industry at ACMA's
spectrum tuneup event
for 5G in the mmWave
bands, SES regulatory
and legal counsel Daniel
Mah said that the
industry had been
dismayed to learn that
bands used by HTS
systems were within the
31GHz block of
frequencies that the ITU
had identified as
potential candidates for
the next generation
mobile standard. Mah
said that the industry
was particularly
concerned about handling
of portions of the 26GHz
mmWave range, upon which
many regional Ka and Ku
band satellite providers
rely, including NBN’s
Sky Muster satellites.
“From a satellite
industry perspective, we
would urge ACMA to
consider prioritising
the portions of the
26GHz band that are not
shared with satellite as
their first 5G pioneer
bands if that’s where
you want to go and then
to look carefully and
deeply at the sharing
conditions in the bands
that are shared with
satellite as part of
(ITU Task Group) 5/1,”
Mah said.
For instance, Mah said
that the 24.65GHz to
25.25GHz range had been
identified as a key
uplink band to feed a
new broadcast satellite
system and that the
industry was undergoing
a degree of “whiplash”
discovering its
inclusion within the
ITU’s prime candidate
band for additional
mobile broadband
options.
To that end, Mah said he
was relieved that
Australia wasn’t
focusing on the 28GHz
band, which some
jurisdictions have
settled on as a front
runner to watch.
More broadly, Mah
explained, many
satellite companies
operate in the Ku and Ka
mmWave bands, including
12 O3b satellites in
orbit with a further
eight to be launched
next year, Inmarsat’s
recently launched Global
Express constellation,
which operate in the
lower part of the band,
and IPStar’s HTS
systems. A further six
companies were planning
to launch
non-geostationary
satellites in the Ka, Q
(33GHz to 50 GHz) and V
(40GHz to 75GHz) bands —
all of which are in the
mmWave territory.
In making the case for
consideration of
satellite in 5G spectrum
planning, Mah said that
orbital data
transmission could play
a pivotal role in the
future 5G ecosystem.
“These bands are very
important to us and we
think it’s not enough to
just think of us as an
incumbent that needs to
be accommodated in some
way or to be relocated
in some way but to think
actively and hard about
how we fit and play a
role in the 5G future,”
Mah said.
For instance, he said
satellite could help
mobile terrestrial
networks achieve sub 1
millisecond latency by
using multicast features
to push content closer
to base stations far
more cost efficiently
than fibre or microwave
links. Also, it could
help avoid potential for
a digital divide by
making sure that the
benefits of 5G network
densification can
succeed beyond urban
areas.
“There is a real risk
that, if you just focus
on terrestrial
technologies, you end up
having 5G and 4G,
especially in mmWave
bands, being something
that provides more
broadband to those that
already have it,” Mah
said. Andrew Colley,
Commsday |
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