July 13, 2017 
 
 
FCC FACT SHEET* 
Wireless License Renewal and Service Continuity Reform 
Second Report and Order and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, WT Docket 10-112 
 
Background:  A core responsibility of the FCC is to issue licenses for the use of wireless radio spectrum 
and to ensure that they are used to make radio communications available to all persons in the United 
States, regardless of where they live.  Wireless licenses are used to provide a wide variety of 
communications across our country, including mobile and fixed broadband services to consumers as well 
as voice, data, and monitoring capabilities, to help drive our nation’s economy and to promote safety of 
life and property.   
 
To ensure that licensees not only begin operating, but remain operating, the Commission has 
adopted rules on construction, service continuity, and renewal of licenses.  But these rules have been 
adopted over decades on a license-by-license basis, resulting in a patchwork of service-specific rules.  
This item aims to harmonize, streamline, and modernize our license renewal and service continuity rules, 
with the goal of providing the consistency, clarity, certainty, and incentives needed to drive investment in 
and deployment of wireless radio services and networks in all areas of the country.  
 
What the Second Report and Order would do: 
? Establish a consistent standard for renewing wireless licenses. 
? Set forth “safe harbors” providing expedited renewal for licensees that meet their initial term 
construction requirement and remain operating at or above that level. 
? Adopt clear, consistent service continuity rules, requiring licensees that permanently discontinue 
using their licenses to return those licenses to the Commission. 
? Eliminate unnecessary, legacy “comparative renewal rules”. 
? Require that, when portions of geographic licenses are sold, both parties to the transaction have a 
clear construction obligation and penalty in the event of failure, closing a loophole used to avoid 
our construction requirements. 
 
What the Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking would do: 
? Seek comment on imposing additional, incremental construction obligations for geographic 
licenses during the renewal terms after the initial license term in order to advance our goal of 
increasing the number of rural Americans with access to wireless communications services. 
? Seek comment on the appropriate penalties and re-licensing frameworks to implement additional, 
incremental requirements.  
                                                            
*  This document is being released as part of a “permit-but-disclose” proceeding.  Any presentations or views on the 
subject expressed to the Commission or its staff, including by email, must be filed in WT Docket No. 10-112, which 
may be accessed via the Electronic Comment Filing System (https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/).  Before filing, participants 
should familiarize themselves with the Commission’s ex parte rules, including the general prohibition on 
presentations (written and oral) on matters listed on the Sunshine Agenda, which is typically released a week prior to 
the Commission’s meeting.  See 47 CFR § 1.1200 et seq.