Attachment SCLAT82

This document pretains to SCL-LIC-20020522-00047 for License on a Submarine Cable Landing filing.

IBFS_SCLLIC2002052200047_310318

    Federal Communications Commission                                             News Media Information 202 1418-0500
    445 12” St., S.W.                                                                   Fax-On-Demand 202 I 418-2830
                                                                                                    TTY 202 I410-2555
    Washington, D.C. 20554                                                                   Internet: http://www.fcc.pov




                                                                                          DA NO. 02-1896
                                                                                   Friday, August 2. 2002



                  ACTIONS TAKEN UNDER CABLE LANDING LICENSE ACT

 Section 1.767(a) Cable Landing Licenses, Modifications, and Assignments or Transfers of Control
                   of Interests in Cable Landing Licenses (47 C.F.R. Q 1.767(a))

By the Chief, Policy Division, International Bureau:

Pursuant to An Act Relating to the Landing and Operation of Submarine Cables in the United States, 47
U.S.C. $0 34-39 (Cable Landing License Act), Executive Order No. 10530, Exec. Ord. No. 10530
reprinted as amended in 3 U.S.C. Q 301, and section 1.767 of the Commission’s rules, 47 C.F.R. Q 1.767,
the following applications ARE GRANTED. These grants of authority are taken under section 0.261 of
the Commission’s rules, 47 C.F.R. Q 0.261, and are effective upon release of this public notice. Petitions
for reconsideration under section 1.106 or applications for review under section 1.115 of the
Commission’s rules, 47 C.F.R. $6 1.106, 1.115, may be filed within 30 days of the date of this public
notice.

This public notice serves as each cable landing licensee’s Cable Landing License, or modification thereto,
pursuant to the Cable Landing License Act and section 1.767 of the Commission’s rules. Cable landing
licensees should review carefully the terms and conditions of their licenses. Failure to comply with these
terms and conditions or relevant Commission rules and policies could result in fines or forfeitures.

The Commission most recently amended its rules applicable to submarine cable landing licenses in
Review of Commission Consideration ofApplications under the Cable Landing License Act, IB Docket
No. 00-106, FCC 01-332 (rel. Dec. 14, 2001), 67 Fed. Reg. 1615 (Jan. 14,2002). An updated version of
sections 1.767 and 1.768 of the rules is available at httD://www.fcc.gov/ib/pd/~f/telecomrules.html.
                                                                                                 See
also http://hraunfoss.fcc.eov/edocs public/attachmatch/DA-02-598A 1 .udf for a March 13,2002 Public
Notice; http:/lhraunfoss.fcc.noviedocs pubIiciattachmatchlFCC-01-332A1 .pdf for the December 14,200
Report and Order.


scL-L1c-20020522-00047                           ALASKA UNITED FIBER SYSTEM PARTNERSHIP

SUBMARINE CABLE LANDING LICENSE


                                               Page 1 of 5


Action Taken: Grant of Authority to Land and Operate a Fiber Optic Submarine Cable System between
Seward, Alaska and Warrenton, Oregon. The cable system will be known as Alaska United West Cable
System (Alaska United West).

Acceotabiliw for Filing Public Notice: June 20,2002. We received no Executive Branch or public
comments.

Regulatory Status of Cable: Alaska United West is a private cable (consistent with NARUC I, 525 F.2d
630, 642 (D.C. Cir. 1976), cert. denied, 425 U.S. 992 (1976)). Applicant proposes to operate on a non-
common carrier basis and the record provides no reason to require the cable to operate on a common
carrier basis.

ADplicable Conditions and Requirements: See the routine conditions set out at 47 C.F.R. 4 1.767(g)(1)-
(14).

Licensee Information: Alaska United Fiber System Partnership, is an Alaska general partnership, owned
in equal shares by GCI Fiber Co., Inc. and Fiber Hold Co. Inc., which are wholly owned subsidiaries of
GCI Transport Co., itself a wholly owned subsidiary of GCI Holdings Inc., which in turn is a wholly
owned subsidiary of GCI, Inc. GCI Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of General Communication Inc.
(GCI). GCI is a corporation organized under the laws of the State of Alaska.

Interlocking Directorates: None

Cable System Design, Capacity. and Proiected In Service Date: Alaska United West Cable will consist of
one undersea cable segment, extending between Warrenton, Oregon and Seward, Alaska. The system will
use standards based Synchronous Optical Network (SONET) terminals at both landing stations. The
terminals will be configured as Add/Drop Ring multiplexers so that traffic from one cable station can be
efficiently routed and groomed to the other station. In addition, Alaska United West will provide ring
protection in conjunction with Alaska United Cable, which extends between Whittier and Juneau, Alaska
and Norma Beach, Washington.

Circuits carried over Alaska United West can be provisioned in all standard signal rates and
configurations. Undersea cable segments will employ Erbium Doped Fiber Amplifiers (EDFAs) to
provide optical amplification over the relatively long segment lengths. EDFAs are not bit-rate sensitive
and can support additional optical channels. Two fiber pairs will be installed, and initial capacity will be
available at 20 GB/s. The system design includes the capability to employ Wavelength Division
Multiplexing (WDM) such that up to 32 individual wavelengths can be transmitted over a single fiber
pair, for an ultimate capacity of 32 internally collapsed ring-protected wavelengths. Some of the
wavelengths will be configured in a geographically diverse ring by interconnecting them with the existing
Alaska United Cable. There is no projected in service date.

Attached Map: See attached map for Alaska United West’s undersea cable segments.

Cable Station Information: Alaska United West will have two landing stations. The first station is
planned for Seward, Alaska. The second station is planned for Warrenton, Oregon. Both cable landing
stations will be owned or long term leased by Alaska United West.

Landing Point Information: Licensees must provide specific description of cable landing stations, see 47
C.F.R. !j 1.767(a)(5), (g)(8).

ROUTINE CONDITIONS APPLICABLE TO ALL LICENSEES. See 47 C.F.R. 9 1.767(g).
                                                Page 2 of 5


(1)       Grant of the cable landing license is subject to: (i) all rules and regulations of the Federal
Communications Commission; (ii) any treaties or conventions relating to communications to which the
United States is or may hereafter become a party; and (iii) any action by the Commission or the Congress of
the United States rescinding, changing, modifying or amending any rights accruing to any person by grant of
the license;

(2)        The location of the cable system within the territorial waters of the United States of America, its
territories and possessions, and upon its shores shall be in conformity with plans approved by the Secretary
of the Army. The cable shall be moved or shifted by the licensee at its expense upon request of the Secretary
of the Army, whenever he or she considers such course necessary in the public interest, for reasons of
national defense, or for the maintenance and improvement of harbors for navigational purposes;

(3)       The licensee shall at all times comply with any requirements of United States government
authorities regarding the location and concealment of the cable facilities, buildings, and apparatus for the
purpose of protecting and safeguarding the cables from injury or destruction by enemies of the United States
of America;

(4)        The licensee, or any person or company controlling it, controlled by it, or under direct or indirect
common control with it, does not enjoy and shall not acquire any right to handle traffic to or from the United
States, its territories or its possessions unless such service is authorized by the Commission pursuant to
section 214 of the Communications Act, as amended;

(5)         (i) The licensee shall be prohibited from agreeing to accept special concessions directly or
indirectly from any foreign carrier, including any entity that owns or controls a foreign cable landing station,
where the foreign carrier possesses sufficient market power on the foreign end of the route to affect
competition adversely in the U.S. market, and from agreeing to accept special concessions in the future. (ii)
For purposes of this section, a special concession is defined as an exclusive arrangement involving services,
facilities, or functions on the foreign end of a U.S. international route that are necessary to land, connect, or
operate submarine cables, where the arrangement is not offered to similarly situated U.S. submarine cable
owners, indefeasible-right-of-user holders, or lessors, and includes arrangements for the terms for
acquisition, resale, lease, transfer and use of capacity on the cable; access to collocation space; the
opportunity to provide or obtain backhaul capacity; access to technical network information; and
interconnection to the public switched telecommunications network.

Note to 6 1.767(~)(5):Licensees may rely on the Commission’s list of foreign carriers that do not qualify for
the presumption that they lack market power in particular foreign points for purposes of determining which
foreign carriers are the subject of the requirements of this section. The Commission’s list of foreign carriers
that do not qualify for the presumption that they lack market power is available from the International
Bureau’s World Wide Web site at http://www.fcc.gov/ib.

(6)        Except as provided in paragraph (7) of this section, the cable landing license and rights granted in
the license shall not be transferred, assigned, or disposed of, or disposed of indirectly by transfer of control of
the licensee, unless the Federal Communications Commission gives prior consent in writing;

(7)       A pro forma assignee or a person or company that is the subject of a pro forma transfer of control
of a cable landing license is not required to seek prior approval for the pro forma transaction. A pro forma
assignee or person or company that is the subject of a pro forma transfer of control must notify the Secretary,
Federal Communications Commission, Washington, D.C. 20554, with a copy to the Chief, International
Bureau, Federal Communications Commission, no later than thirty (30) days after the assignment or transfer
of control is consummated. The notification may be in the form of a letter (in duplicate to the Secretary), and
it must contain a certification that the assignment or transfer of control was pro forma, as defined in 0

                                                   Page 3 of 5


63.24(a) of this chapter, and, together with all previous pro forma transactions, does not result in a change of
the licensee’s ultimate control. A single letter may be filed for an assignment or transfer of control of more
than one license issued in the name of a licensee if each license is identified by the file number under which
it was granted;

(8)        Unless the licensee has notified the Commission in the application of the precise locations at which
the cable will land, as required by paragraph (a)(5) of this section, the licensee shall notify the Commission
no later than ninety (90) days prior to commencing construction at that landing location. The Commission
will give public notice of the filing of each description, and grant of the cable landing license will be
considered final with respect to that landing location unless the Commission issues a notice to the contrary
no later than sixty (60) days after receipt of the specific description. See 8 1.767(a)(5)of this section;

(9)       The Commission reserves the right to require the licensee to file an environmental assessment
should it determine that the landing of the cable at the specific locations and construction of necessary cable
landing stations may significantly affect the environment within the meaning of 9 1.1307 of this part
implementing the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969. See 1.1307(a) and (b) of this part. The
cable landing license is subject to modification by the Commission under its review of any environmental
assessment or environmental impact statement that it may require pursuant to its rules. See also 9 1.1306
note 1 and 9 I. 1307(c) and (d) of this part;

(10)     The Commission reserves the right, pursuant to section 2 of the Cable Landing License Act, 47
U.S.C. 35, Executive Order No. 10530 as amended, and section 214 of the Communications Act of 1934, as
amended, 47 U.S.C. 214, to impose common carrier regulation or other regulation consistent with the Cable
Landing License Act on the operations of the cable system if it finds that the public interest so requires;

(1 1)      The licensee, or in the case of multiple licensees, the licensees collectively, shall maintain de jure
and de facto control of the U.S. portion of the cable system, including the cable landing stations in the United
States, sufficient to comply with the requirements of the Commission’s rules and any specific conditions of
the license;

(12)      The licensee shall comply with the requirements of 0 1.768 of this part;

(13)      The cable landing license is revocable by the Commission after due notice and opportunity for
hearing pursuant to section 2 of the Cable Landing License Act, 47 U.S.C. 35, or for failure to comply with
the terms of the license or with the Commission’s rules; and

(14)       The licensee shall notify the Secretary, Federal Commissions Commission, Washington, D.C.
20554, in writing, within thirty (30) days of the date the cable is placed into service, of the date the cable was
placed into service. The cable landing license shall expire twenty-five (25) years from the in-service date,
unless renewed or extended upon proper application. Upon expiration, all rights granted under the license
shall be terminated.

REQUIREMENTS APPLICABLE TO LICENSES AFFILIATED WITH A CARRIER WITH
MARKET POWER IN A CABLE’S WTO DESTINATION MARKET. See 47 C.F.R. &j
                                                                 1.767(1).

Any licensee that is, or is affiliated with, a carrier with market power in any of the cable’s WTO Member
destination countries, and that requests streamlined processing of an application under paragraphs (j)-(k) of
this section, must comply with the following requirements:

(1)       File quarterly reports summarizing the provisioning and maintenance of all network facilities and
services procured from the licensee’s affiliate in that destination market, within ninety (90) days from the end
                                                   Page 4 of 5


of each calendar quarter. These reports shall contain the following: (i) the types of facilities and services
provided (for example, a lease of wet link capacity in the cable, collocation of licensee’s equipment in the
cable station with the ability to provide backhaul, or cable station and backhaul services provided to the
licensee); (ii) for provisioned facilities and services, the volume or quantity provisioned, and the time intervaLj ,
between order and delivery; and (iii) the number of outages and intervals between fault report and facility or
service restoration; and

(2)       File quarterly circuit status reports, within ninety (90) days from the end of each calendar quarter
and in the format set out by the 4 43.82 annual circuit status manual with the exception that activated or idle
circuits must be reported on a facility-by-facility basis and derived circuits need not be specified. See 4
63.10(~)(5)of this chapter.


For additional information, contact the International Bureau’s Policy Division at 202-41 8-1460.




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Document Created: 2003-04-02 10:58:23
Document Modified: 2003-04-02 10:58:23

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