LIVE FROM CTIA SUPER MOBILITY WEEK: US mobile operators lined up to hit back at calls for them to be covered by the same net neutrality rules as fixed players.

Executives from AT&T, Sprint owner Softbank and T-Mobile US – three of the four leading US operators – spoke out in a session on net neutrality and network investment, following a strong appearance the previous day by FCC chief Tom Wheeler.

Net neutrality was one of three areas on which Wheeler talked.

His speech was referenced by Bruce Gottlieb, Softbank’s EVP of legal and regulatory affairs, who picked up on an observation Wheeler made about walled gardens, a failed attempt by operators several years ago to control the mobile internet.

“It suggests that competition does not assure openness,” Wheeler said 24 hours earlier.

Gottlieb argued that there has been “a real shift to more open mobile environment” since the old days. “To my view, the trend has been very positive,” he said, the point being that potential concerns were answered by industry itself without regulatory intervention.

Wheeler said companies including Microsoft argued in favour of the same legal framework applying to both mobile and fixed players for net neutrality.

The basis for this argument is that the market power of mobile broadband has risen markedly since 2010, when the rules were devised.

Leonard Cali, SVP of global public policy with AT&T Service, disagreed. Managing a radio network is different from running a fixed network, he said. “Taking one set of rules from one platform and applying to another is not the answer.”

The existing rules strike the correct balance between mobile and fixed networks, he said, a point backed by Luisa Lancetti, T-Mobile US’s chief counsel for law and policy. “The current balance is extremely effective,” she said.

“The balance of requirements will remain different between fixed and wireless,” she continued, because of their inherent properties.