In the past, I had pointed to many reasons for the assignment of spectrum for satellite services administratively and not by auctions. Today, I plan to take you through the complex process of interference management for the satellite spectrum. After going through this note you will appreciate why auctioning of satellite spectrum will lead to a disastrous situation, thereby preventing the regulator from intervening and dampening the incentive for the satellite players to coordinate, and make investments in improving the capabilities of their technology to drive spectrum efficiencies, etc. Hence, without wasting any more time let’s begin.
Sharing is Mandatory
Sharing of spectrum is a mandatory requirement for all Satellite players. Why? Unlike terrestrial players, they (satellite players) can’t harness even a fraction of the capacity of the assignment spectrum due to their limited “spectrum reuse” capabilities. “Spectrum reuse” is nothing but the capability of the network to be able to use the same block of the spectrum repeatedly throughout the geography. Greater the reuse capability, the higher the spectrum capacity that can get harnessed. Terrestrial networks (due to their much smaller cell size compared to the satellite) can harness significantly greater capacity from the same spectrum compared to their satellite counterparts. Now, sharing can be of two types – a) Sharing with satellites that are in geosynchronous orbits (GSO) with respect to the earth; b) Sharing with satellites that are in non-geosynchronous orbits (NGSO) with respect to the earth.
