Anterix, the company pushing the FCC to adopt rules to realign the 900 MHz band to allow Anterix to lease broadband spectrum to electric utilities and other critical infrastructure industries (CII) entities, offered details on five experimental licenses and amended its proposed rules for mandatory relocation.

The FCC barred use of funds from its $8.5 billion a year Universal Service Fund (USF) to purchase equipment and services from companies that pose a national security threat. The commission’s order initially designates Huawei Technologies and ZTE as companies covered by this rule and establishes a process for designating additional covered companies in the future.

The FCC adopted rules that will help first responders locate people who call 9-1-1 from wireless phones in multistory buildings. The rules will help emergency responders determine the floor level of a 9-1-1 caller, which will reduce emergency response times and ultimately save lives, a statement said.

The Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA), the Utilities Technology Council (UTC) and the Edison Electric Institute (EEI) petitioned the FCC for an extension of the April 17, 2020, deadline by which existing Part 90 3.65 – 3.7 GHz service licensees are required to complete the transition of their operations to comply with the Part 96 Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) rules.

Bittium, Athonet, Nemergent and the Mission Critical Open Platform (MCOP) project tested multivendor end-to-end ciphered mission-critical push-to-talk (MCPTT) calls. The test took place during the fourth MCX Plugtests organized by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) in Kuopio, Finland, in September.

The Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO) laid out more detail about its concerns with the FCC’s proposed rules for indoor location accuracy for 9-1-1 calls. The FCC is expected to vote on the draft order Nov. 22.

Kymeta partnered with the city of Redmond, Washington, to test hybrid satellite and Long Term Evolution (LTE) connectivity during the Cascadia Rising exercise in October. The company equipped three emergency response vehicles from the city with a platform that blends satellite and cellular coverage to make communications during a disaster more resilient and reliable.

General Devices (GD) and MD1 partnered to provide mobile telemedicine and enhanced team communication throughout the MD1 program region. Physicians from the MD1 program will use the GD e-Bridge app on their mobile devices for live HIPAA-secure video and communications both pre-arrival and on the scene of critical emergencies that they respond to.

Verizon, in partnership with Responder Corp., announced five companies that make up the third and final group of startups for 2019 known as Cohort 3 for the 5G First Responder Lab program.

There are 161 certified devices for the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) network, according to a recently released document from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), which is charged with developing a list of devices that meet standards for access to the FirstNet network.