National development

On the front line - shaping wireless policy by Meredith Attwell Baker, Acting Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), helps shape US Government domestic and international policies to foster increased private sector innovation and investment in the telecommunications and information industries. The agency aims to improve the nation’s competitiveness and economic growth, and guide interactions with foreign policy makers to open markets worldwide. They strive for a technology-neutral approach, with investment decisions driven by perceived market value and technical merit. The NTIA has actively pursued reforms to free up spectrum for commercial use.

Meredith Attwell Baker is the Acting Assistant Secretary and Administrator National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) U.S. Department of Commerce. Ms Baker joined the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) in January 2004 as senior advisor and also served on detail to the White House, Office of Science and Technology Policy. Before joining NTIA, she was Vice President of Williams Mullen Strategies where she focused on telecommunications, intellectual property and international trade issues. Ms Baker’s previous experience includes serving as Senior Counsel to Covad Communications, and as Director of Congressional Affairs at the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA). Ms Baker worked for the Fifth Circuit and the law firm of DeLange & Hudspeth, LLP and, as well, in the Legislative Affairs Office of the U.S. State Department in Washington, D.C.

Meredith Attwell Baker is a member of the Texas State Bar. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Washington & Lee University and a Law degree from the University of Houston.

By any metric - the number of subscribers, broadband services with speeds comparable many of the more recent innovations that are minutes of use, plan options, applications, to wireline platforms. now reaching the commercial market. service providers, or handset offerings - commercial mobile services have experienced The role of NTIA The race between 3G and 4G systems is less astonishing growth over the course of their important from a policy perspective than the relatively short history. In just 25 years, As Acting Assistant Secretary of Commerce technological and competitive leapfrogging wireless service has evolved from novelty to and Acting Administrator of the National it represents. Our focus at the national policy expediency for more than 255 million mobile Telecommunications and Information level is not on the finish line, but rather subscribers in the United States and over Administration (NTIA), I serve on the on the factors that make the race possible. three billion subscribers worldwide. With front lines in the shaping of domestic and By remaining technologically neutral, nearly one in seven wireless-only American international policies that will foster increased encouraging the elimination of unnecessary households and a penetration rate reaching private sector innovation and investment regulation, and making the critical resource 84 per cent of the U.S. population, demand in the telecommunications and information of spectrum available for commercial for wireless connectivity for voice, data industries. Together these objectives anchor applications, our Federal policies contribute and video applications, from the city to the nation’s competitiveness and economic significantly to the robust commercial countryside, in our homes and in transit, has growth, and guide our interactions with wireless market our nation now enjoys. never been greater. foreign policy makers to open markets worldwide. Policy Leadership - Early in the Like the evolution in handset technology, from Administration, President Bush recognized the lone ‘brick’ model of 1983 to the slim, Also guiding our policy formulation and that advanced high-speed communications multi-functional devices in today’s market, advocacy is a technology-neutral approach, and information networks - broadband - held the wireless landscape has experienced a with investment decisions driven by perceived particular promise to catalyze American rapid transformation. Advances in services market value and technical merit rather than productivity and economic growth, and and applications arrive with increasing speed government policy prescriptions. Had U.S. to revolutionize our culture and quality of and frequency, each successive generation of policy makers prescribed a single technical life. That is, broadband technology offers wireless technology giving consumers faster standard in early wireless allocation and consumers new tools facilitating e-commerce, and more diverse mobile capabilities. We licensing decisions, it could have diverted the increased opportunities for tele-work, tele- now stand on the threshold of genuine mobile investment and research activities that led to medicine, and distance learning; and rich, new

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information and entertainment applications. Government to use spectrum stems in part federal entities for spectrum to support new In announcing a goal of universal, affordable from the President’s 21st Century Spectrum services and systems. broadband by 2007, and plenty of choice Policy Initiative, announced in May among broadband providers thereafter, the 2003. The Initiative’s purpose is bold but Another component of the Spectrum Initiative President made broadband development and straightforward: to develop a spectrum policy is the creation of a Spectrum Test-Bed. deployment a keystone of his technology that fosters economic growth, ensures our Working in collaboration with the FCC, agenda. national and homeland security, maintains we will be able to objectively evaluate new U.S. global leadership in communications technologies to facilitate sharing between Implementation of the President’s broadband technology and service, and satisfies other Federal and non-Federal spectrum users in a vision has been one of NTIA’s highest vital U.S. needs such as public safety, test environment. The test-bed is scheduled to priorities. Through a comprehensive scientific research, transportation, and law become operational this summer. package of technology, fiscal, and regulatory enforcement. policies, the Administration has sought to NTIA has also reached out to the private liberate ingenuity and entrepreneurship, Consistent with the Spectrum Initiative, we sector for advice on developing and stimulate innovation and competition, and endorsed legislation in 2004 to reallocate implementing spectrum efficiencies. In 2006, create incentives for private investment in spectrum used by the Federal government we established the Commerce Spectrum broadband technologies and infrastructure. in the 1710-1755 MHz band for commercial Management Advisory Committee, composed NTIA documented the Administration’s policy Advanced Wireless Services. In March of representatives of the private sector, efforts and the effect on U.S. broadband 2008, NTIA transmitted to Congress our to provide advice on domestic spectrum growth in Networked Nation: Broadband in first annual report on Federal agencies’ management and policies. Their work has America, 2007, released in January 2008. progress in relocating their affected wireless focused on improving spectrum efficiencies communications systems from this band. The and the use of economic incentives in Federal In the report, we noted that commercial report shows that Federal agencies’ actual spectrum management. mobile services are the fastest growing sector relocation times and costs generally fell of America’s broadband economy (see chart below estimates. We continue to work with We are also engaged at the international level below). In the past eight years, the number of Federal agencies to relocate these systems in ensuring the availability of spectrum that wireless broadband subscribers jumped from expeditiously in order to facilitate more rapid will support broader markets for advanced 97 million to 256 million, almost a three-fold introduction of new commercial services. wireless services. For example, at the World increase; and the average number of minutes Radiocommunication Conference (WRC) per month used by subscribers grew at an Among the specific actions taken pursuant held in the Fall of 2007, the United States even higher rate, from 228 minutes to 746 to the Spectrum Initiative, NTIA earlier this successfully advocated the reallocation of minutes per month. With responsibility for the year released the Federal Strategic Spectrum the 700 MHz band for advanced wireless management of spectrum use by the federal Plan, the most comprehensive compilation of systems, such as International Mobile government, NTIA has played a key role information to date on how Federal agencies Telecommunications 2000 (or IMT-2000). in facilitating the availability of the limited use spectrum. The Spectrum Plan calls for Coupled with an agreement to include spectrum resource for growth in commercial “a new, evolutionary model for spectrum WiMAX in the IMT-2000 family of mobile services. management” to enable federal agencies to get technologies, this action offers the potential of more use from the same amount of spectrum, a larger, more competitive, and open market thereby ensuring access to spectrum for for a variety of advanced wireless services. further private sector growth and innovation. The notion that new technologies can be The plan also contains a set of rapidly deployed through market competition recommendations to improve federal users’ and reduced regulation, with lower prices spectrum efficiencies. These recommendations and high quality services, is well supported include encouraging federal agencies to use throughout the telecommunications industry. commercial wireless services where feasible; It was a principle motivation for, and the employing dynamic access and ‘smart’ radio express policy articulated in, the last major technologies to improve adaptability and amendments to the Communications Act flexibility within an operational environment; of 1934 enacted in 1996. This approach increasing spectrum sharing among federal has greatly contributed to the deployment users and between federal and non-federal of broadband, the proliferation of Internet Spectrum Reform - Wireless technologies users; and improving coordination among services and applications, and the explosion and services support the missions of sixty- federal spectrum users and with the private in wireless technologies, among other five federal departments and agencies. As sector, among others. technological advances. changing priorities increase the demand for mobility and agility by Federal spectrum With the Federal Strategic Spectrum Plan as From my vantage point in government, users, and demand for spectrum to support a foundation, NTIA will work in coordination I believe it is essential to maintain such advanced wireless services from the private with the Federal Communications policies to foster the continued growth sector grows, NTIA’s attention to greater Commission (FCC), which manages non- across each and every wireless metric. The efficiencies in Federal spectrum use has federal spectrum use, to create a National benefits to American consumers and to our greatly intensified in recent years. Strategic Spectrum Plan. The National Plan overall economy - whether 3G, 4G or both will address spectrum requirements for technologies - will almost certainly accrue Our efforts to devise more efficient essential Federal missions; state and local from this further evolution in commercial and dynamic methods for the Federal spectrum needs; and requirements of non- mobile services. n

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