FCC Flooded With Opposition to NextNav’s GPS Backup Proposal

WASHINGTON, April 30, 2025 – An effort to shift control over a heavily used piece of unlicensed spectrum ran into strong resistance at the Federal Communications Commission on Monday.

A wide range of tech companies, internet providers, and public safety advocates, urged the FCC to reject NextNav’s bid to rework the 900 MegaHertz (MHz) band as a GPS backup system.

NextNav is asking the FCC to approve a spectrum swap: trading 14 megahertz of shared, low-power spectrum for 15 megahertz of full-power, flexible-use spectrum in the Lower 900 MHz band. The company says the change is necessary to support its terrestrial 3D Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) service — a proposed backup to GPS.

The FCC launched a proceeding in March (WT Docket No. 25-110) to explore complementary PNT technologies to GPS, after NextNav petitioned the FCC in April 2024. The inquiry was initiated by FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, who cited growing concerns about GPS vulnerabilities and the national security risks posed by spoofing and jamming threats.

In its filing to the FCC Monday, NextNav reiterated that delaying action ignores the threat of GPS disruption from adversaries. But opponents shot back saying NextNav’s plan may create other security issues.

In an interview, senior manager of government relations for the Security Industry Association, Lauren Bresette, told Broadband Breakfast the proposal would force entire systems offline, devastating millions of door locks, fire alarms, and public safety systems​.

“These are low power radio frequency [devices]... they wouldn't be able to shift to Wi Fi, they would require an additional power source if they were to do that,” Bresette said. 

“We strongly believe that the docket [will] show that there's a lot of alternative technologies out there that this would cause potential interference to, harming critical safety and security devices,” Bresette said.

Bresette’s concerns were echoed in the reply comments of New America’s Open Technology Institute and Public Knowledge which said NextNav’s proposal “fails to accurately account for the potential harms done to incumbent users.”

The groups warned that the plan would “decimate” the Lower 900 MHz band, which supports hundreds of millions of unlicensed devices – including smart home systems, medical equipment, agricultural sensors, and industrial Internet of Things tools.

Several commenters, including the OTI and Public Knowledge, estimate that NextNav’s proposed PNT system would in reality require as little as 5% of the 15 megahertz it seeks to reconfigure.

“NextNav itself has acknowledged that its PNT proposal would require use of only a fraction of the 15 megahertz it requests,” the two groups wrote, suggesting the entire proposal was little more than “a transparent bid for a windfall.”

Although the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, which advises the White House on spectrum policy, called the proceeding “timely and proper” in comments Monday, NTIA emphasized the need for a “whole-of-government” approach and warned that any spectrum reallocation should not come at the expense of incumbents.

A growing number of commenters, including NTIA, pointed to alternatives that could strengthen GPS resilience without requiring new spectrum reallocation.

NTIA specifically highlighted: space-based PNT technologies and solutions utilizing low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite systems; Broadcast Positioning Systems (BPS), which delivers precise timing information within the ATSC 3.0 broadcast signal and would not require dedicated spectrum and infrastructure; and, eLoran, which would upgrade the original Loran system operating in the 90–110 kHz range.

The National Association of Broadcasters also championed Broadcast Positioning Systems (BPS) as a promising backup technology. BPS would use existing Next Gen TV infrastructure to embed precise timing data in over-the-air television signals.

In their comments, NextNav said it supports the FCC’s exploration of multiple PNT technologies, including those mentioned above — but maintained that at least one market-driven, terrestrial solution must be deployed at scale.

Other notable commenters included: the Telecommunications Industry Association, which strongly opposed NextNav’s proposal saying there are better PNT options; WISPA – the Association for Broadband Without Borders, which argued that there is no “single solution”; and the GPS Innovation Alliance, which cautioned against overstating the need for GPS backups given the system’s 99.9998% availability. 

Wireless industry association CTIA voiced broad support for the FCC’s broader inquiry into PNT technologies. Apple, meanwhile, raised concerns about antenna size and power consumption, questioning how terrestrial PNT systems would be feasibly integrated into consumer devices.