In the FCC’s incentive spectrum auction proceeding, Information Age Economics (IAE) complains about the reliance of some in the industry (CTIA and Verizon, to name a couple) on a spectrum efficiency metric that simply divides an operator’s nationwide spectrum holdings by the number of subscribers. This results, in one example they give, of Sprint having 3.57 Hz per subscriber and Verizon having 1.05 Hz per subscriber. Some take this as Verizon using spectrum more efficiently, and perhaps being at a disadvantage. As IAE points out, however, spectrum is not partitioned to users this way: cellular infrastructure allows for frequency reuse. If one wants to compare the spectrum efficiency of Sprint and Verizon, don’t look at it nationwide — look at, say, Washington, D.C.
Steven J. Crowley, P.E.
Consulting Engineer