Rivada’s Ganley calls on FirstNet to share revenues with states, provide free service to public safety

If the Rivada Mercury bidding team is selected to be FirstNet’s nationwide contractor, Ganley said he would accept the legal position taken by FirstNet.

“I was in the Irish army years ago; I learned how to salute,” he said. “We don’t make the rules. But no award has been made yet, so this may be the last time you hear me speaking this liberally. If we win, and I am told, ‘This is it. This is what we’re going to do. You better shut up, Ganley, and stop saying that this was the intention of the legislation and everything else,’ I’ll shut up. I might be biting my bottom lip, but I’ll shut up.

“But that’s not going to make the problem go away. It’s not going to change the mind of states, when they are looking at the intent and law of this legislation—it’s not going to change it.”

Ganley said that allowing states to keep a portion of excess revenue generated within its borders would not jeopardize the ability to fund the network deployment in less-populous states, citing California in a hypothetical example.

“I still think, in that scenario, there is a process with FirstNet and on the licensing of the spectrum that allows California to be a contributor. California ends up generating so much revenue that California ends up being a contributor anyway, and I think there’s a negotiation to be had with any state that … comes to the conclusion that they want to ‘opt out’ that they still get to contribute revenues, share revenues with FirstNet in a way that allows FirstNet to get the mission fulfilled.

“Opt out does not exclude FirstNet. If somebody opts out, it’s not a rejection of FirstNet. It’s a different approach. They’re going to be interoperable … They’re still going to be part of the nationwide public-safety broadband network. If part of the motivation for opting out is over revenue, I think that there’s a path to make sure that FirstNet and the nationwide public-safety mission still gets to benefit from revenue coming from opt-out states.”