LightSquared Asks FCC To Extend Deadline

The Federal Communications Commission granted LightSquared's request for an extended deadline for filing preliminary research on potential interference, just hours before the highly anticipated report was due.

A mass amount of new data forced LightSquared to ask federal regulators to extend the deadline by two weeks, a company spokesman said. The report will spark the next stage of debate between LightSquared and opponents who worry the company's plan could block global positioning systems. LightSquared wants to build a nationwide broadband network, but the GPS industry says the new system could interfere with GPS receivers. LightSquared was due to submit preliminary research on potential interference to the FCC by 11:59 pm June 15. But much of the data was submitted to the company late June 14 and was still coming in on June 15, giving LightSquared staff little time to process and analyze the information, a spokesman said. LightSquared asked the FCC to extend the deadline to July 1st.