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Happy Valentine's Day: US government breaks up with LightSquared

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The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said today that it will not approve LightSquared's proposal to build a national 4G-LTE network, after testing showed that the network would interfere with most existing GPS devices. The decision came swiftly after the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) today warned the FCC that "LightSquared's proposed mobile broadband network will impact GPS services and that there is no practical way to mitigate the… (arstechnica.com) 更多...

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preacher1
preacher1 8
bout time. if there hadn't been such political favoritism, it wouldn't have gotten this far in the first place.
WALLACE24
WALLACE24 1
No kidding! This should have been DOA.
wdbox
Dave Boxmeyer 2
It is nice to see our goverment do the right thing for a change. And to a rich, politically connectd organization, to boot. However, with $3B invested I can assure you that this is far from over. After all this is America where if you can't get what you want, than send in the lawyers. I hope they spend another billion on lawyers and loose that too. This whole thing was a scam from the start. They paid dirt for the spectrum and never had any intention of using it for a satellite based system. They tried to beat the system and lost. Too bad.
earendil
earendil 1
It's about time.

tartarus12
Robert Curley 1
Come on guys. I expect more from you. Barack Obama is in full campaign mode right now. Every move from now until November is designed to get him re-elected. Sure this idea is unpopular but Lightsquared has given a LOT of money to Obama. Do you really think they are just going to accept this decision? They will double down and hope Barry gets re-elect. If that happens airline safety will be sacrificed just like the second amendment will be.
SFeTed
Ted Liversidge 1
I hope this kills LightSquared, but I'll bet they will still try pull more political strings as well work the media!
jenkins75043
Wow! All those political contributions by LightSquared principals gone to waste. This is one of the few instances of "governmental waste" which does not upset me.
cmarckwardt
I am intrigued that the last couple of paragraphs make it sound like it is all the fault of the GPS manufacturers. Especially the flip crack about cell phone GPS. I wouldn't rely on my i-Phone to prvode me approach vectors and glideslope in IFR to an unfamiliar airport, nor would I want to be concerned that my positioning is compromised by someone playing Words With Friends.
tskubal
Thomas Skubal 1
I'll have to see if my Garmin auto GPS boots up quicker, like it did back in 2010.
Cloudjocky
Bill Janzen 1
So quit charging me an extra $10 a month on my phone for 4G service that practically doesn't exist and now won't.
mdlacey
Matt Lacey 1
You willingly entered into a private contract for your cell phone rate. If they've breached it, sue them. You pays your money, you takes your chances.
Rszent
As the House prepares to launch official investigations of both Solyndra and LightSquared, investigators need to look closely at exactly how the Obama FCC’s unusual January 2011 waiver for LightSquared promised the politically-connected company a stunning corporate windfall. The waiver gave the company a green light to use its initial satellite bandwidth license for “exclusive terrestrial purposes.” As the Telecom, Media and Finance Associates, Inc. blog explains, this meant that “the spectrum rights would be considered (and valued) as equivalent to terrestrial spectrum, allowing LightSquared to raise additional funds to build out its network. In fact that is exactly what LightSquared then proceeded to do, by raising $586M, secured against its spectrum assets, in February 2011.”
Rszent
Hey, look on the bright side, America: at least the Obama team didn’t rip you off for another half-billion dollars here, like they did with Solyndra. They’re just playing games with weather warnings and the air-traffic control system on behalf of their loyal contributors. If you don’t fly on airplanes or live in a place that has weather, you have nothing to worry about.
SFeTed
Ted Liversidge 1
Richard; To your list you might add the DOD, framers plowing; SAR ground pounders and fishermen to only point out a few of the people who were/are worried about what quick buck LightSquired, their hedge fund investors and DC, (with hand out) friends are trying to pull! Congress has talked about doing am investigation, however from the last I read, the FCC has refused to turn over the LightSquired files to congress! What's all that about? The whole deal smells like week old fish! I can tell you that searching in the wilderness in the night in a snow storm with the treat of losing dependable navigation from our handheld GPS units no small deal. People would die!
canuck44
canuck44 -1
Good news for GPS users and the future of space based ATC.

Watch the other hand if you are a T-Mobile user as the German parent has said they will not invest in the company and the Administration already nixed the merger with AT&T even though the FTC said it was no problem. Doesn't matter to most of us who use AT&T or Verison except AT&T crappy service is legislated to continue.

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