[Ground-station] Paid personnel as operators or license grantees of Amateur Satellites

[Bruce Perens]

Paid Ground-Station Control Operators and Amateur Sattelites

Paid personnel are not allowed to be control operator or license grantee of
Amateur Satellites. In the United States, this means that a paid employee
of the sponsoring organization of the satellite, for example a professor at
the university that has built the satellite, can not be a control operator
or the license grantee.

I recently corresponded with our IARU Divison 2 representatives regarding
this issue. Thanks to Edson W. R. Pereira PY2SDR and Ray Soifer W2RS for
this information:

The issue regarding paid operators is due to the definition of the amateur
radio service as defined by the ITU.

ARTICLE 1 Terms and definitions

   - No. 1.56 amateur service: A radiocommunication service for the purpose
   of self-training, intercommunication and technical investigations carried
   out by amateurs, that is, by duly authorized persons interested in radio
   technique solely with a personal aim and without pecuniary interest.
   - No. 1.57 amateur-satellite service: A radiocommunication service using
   space stations on earth satellites for the same purposes as those of the
   amateur service.
   - No. 1.96 amateur station: A station in the amateur service.

The same definition is used by the FCC: https://www.fcc.gov/wireless/b
ureau-divisions/mobility-division/amateur-radio-service

The key point here is the term “pecuniary interest” — in otther words,
“without financial compensation”. The definition is related to the
*operation* of an amateur radio station, as you have stated in your
message. Persons, including amateur radio operators, could be financially
compensated to design and build amateur satellites, but according to the
regulations, as they are presently written, the person cannot be
compensated to operate the station.
 If the station will operate under a US FCC amateur license, the control
operator may not be an employee of the sponsoring organization, whether or
not he is being directly compensated for operating the station.  The
license grantee is also deemed to be the operator of the space station
operating under his license.
For those reasons, FCC licenses most Cubesats as experimental, not
amateur.  Experimental licenses do permit operators to be compensated.
However, experimental stations may not communicate with amateur stations.
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