Is dynamic spectrum arbitrage right for FirstNet? Watch videos and judge for yourself

This almost-real-time-preemption capability should be attractive to public safety, which never was comfortable with the uncertain—and potentially slow—manner in which first responders would be given access to the bandwidth generated by shared network using legacy approaches contemplated several years ago. Whether commercial entities are as comfortable with the arrangement—and therefore willing to bid meaningful amounts of money for the right to use capacity that public safety does not need at a particular moment—is one of the core questions that must be examined.

An aside: One unfortunate aspect of this new approach is its name. Personally, it is far too easy to confuse dynamic spectrum arbitrage with another DSA—dynamic spectrum access—that is a fundamental capability of cognitive radio (actually, my mind knows which DSA I’m talking about, but my mouth does not always cooperate).

More important, the term “dynamic spectrum arbitrage” is almost a misnomer, because what really would be shared and auctioned is the bandwidth capacity generated by the FirstNet system, not the spectrum itself—the airwaves would remain licensed to FirstNet at all times. Of course, the available bandwidth is directly related to the amount of spectrum, so “dynamic spectrum arbitrage” makes some sense. Still, part of me wonders whether a label like “dynamic bandwidth arbitrage” might be more accurate and be more palatable to the first-responder community.

While the general concept of dynamic spectrum arbitrage certainly makes sense, explaining the myriad nuances associated with the approach is not easy. We have tried on numerous occasions—in a guest column, a feature story and a webinar—but none of these allowed us to examine this model in the kind of depth necessary to allow public safety and other interested parties to make an informed decision about it.

With this in mind, I met with Rivada Networks CEO Declan Ganley last Friday to conduct a series of video interviews about dynamic spectrum arbitrage that hopefully provides a comprehensive explanation of the various perspectives—from the view of public safety, commercial bidders and others—associated with the model while addressing many of the questions being asked about it. The first of those videos can be viewed on the IWCE’s Urgent Communications website today, and the rest of the series will be posted during the next few weeks.

This proposal is different than anything that’s been put forth before; it wasn’t even possible, until some technological breakthroughs occurred a few years ago, according to Ganley. As such, there are a ton of questions that should be asked and answered before FirstNet considers using this approach within the business model of arguably one of the most important infrastructure projects in communications history.

My goal in this endeavor is to let Ganley—an intriguing speaker, whether you agree with his opinions or not—address many of the issues surrounding dynamic spectrum arbitrage, in his own words. Hopefully, this will help our audience reach a decision on the subject and/or come up with questions that I didn’t think to ask. Such an informed debate on this topic is needed, especially with so much on the line.