WISPAPALOOZA Show Daily Day 1

6 WISPA PALOOZA SHOW I OCTOBER 8 - 12, 2018 www.bekabusinessmedia.com DAY 1 L Z OO 2018 T he time has come for new directions in federal policy to close the urban-rural digital divide, based on the plain fact that fixed wireless is the solution to much of our country’s rural broadband challenge. Specifically, if we can achieve better align- ment among universal service policy, infra- structure policy and spectrum policy, we can begin to make the digital divide a thing of the past. Historically, these three areas of policy have been on separate tracks, but in reality they are interrelated, and fixed wireless offers a path to progress through all three. Already, hundreds of WISPA members are delivering reliable, affordable broadband to more than 4 million Americans in areas that would otherwise be digital deserts. Maxed-out personal credit cards and entrepreneurial grit have built these businesses, not federal subsidies. Nation- wide, fixed wireless is on track to more than double its subscribership to more than 10 million Americans over the next five years. Perhaps the strongest growth driver is the relatively low cost to deploy fixed wireless, which is a fraction of the cost of fiber. That’s why our universal service policy should recognize the cost-effectiveness of deployment as a key factor in doling out subsidies. Cost-effectiveness was a factor in the FCC’s recent Connect America Fund “reverse auction,” and more than half of the funding was won by fixed-wireless operators. But the FCC’s cost model for other subsidies is still based on a fiber-to-the-home deployment model, which makes no sense for most of rural America. Likewise, a cost-effectiveness criterion is missing from the USDA Rural Utili- ties Service’s grant and loan programs. That needs to change. On the infrastructure front, the FCC and Congress have been working to streamline rules for small cells and deployment on federal lands. WISPA supports those efforts. But broadband infrastructure is more than just copper, fiber, radio, and towers. Radio spectrum is also infrastructure. We cannot even get to the point of building towers and hanging radios if there is not enough spectrum available on terms that small, rural providers can afford. Unfortunately, that is not the case today. Spectrum policy is overwhelmingly titled in favor of the large mobile wireless carriers and against small, rural providers. If the goal is making modern broadband avail- able to every rural home and business; and fixed wireless is the most cost- effective technology; and larger companies are forced by Wall Street to focus on the largest, most lucrative markets, then we need to ensure that more spectrum is available on terms that make it possible for smaller providers to compete and win in auctions. In the past, spectrum policy was based on the idea that a given swath of airwaves could only be used by one party in one geographic area at any given time. That’s like leasing a single lane of a highway to a single company and barring anyone else from getting in that lane, even where it is empty for miles. Fortunately, the increasing sophistication of spectrum-sharing technology is allowing more entities to use the same spectrum in the same geographic area in a coordinated way. Advanced, flexible use regimes are at the vanguard of new spectrum policy, and we should do all we can to move those forward. We also need to make sure that spectrum licenses are right-sized. In other words, just as it does not make sense to build a six-lane highway to serve a town of 1,000 people, nor does it make sense to ask broadband providers who want to serve a small town to buy spec- trum rights across much larger areas. To make another analogy: that’s like asking a small busi- ness owner to lease an entire shopping mall when all they need is a kiosk. This is why census-tract licenses make so much sense. Smaller license areas mean more broadband for rural America, and it means more competition and innovation everywhere. If and when the government licenses shared access in small areas instead of monopoly rights over large areas, we’ll no longer have the empty-lane problem. The highest-value use in every local area – as measured by the bidders’ willingness to pay – will be the use that wins at auction, whether that’s a local public safety agency, a hospital, a university, a resort operator, a stadium, or a local fixed wireless operator. All kinds of bidders – even large wireless carriers and 5G use cases – will be able to access and use localized spectrum in ways that makes sense for a variety of consumers. In contrast, county-sized licenses, as the FCC now proposes in the CBRS band, may work for some small broadband providers in some counties but not for all of them. Hundreds of U.S. counties cover thousands of square miles, and many contain both urban and rural areas. Outlying areas in such counties are generally ignored by the larger carriers today – unless subsidies are attached – and these areas will remain ignored under this new proposal. If we can rationalize the subsidy struc- ture to support comparable services at lower cost to the government, and if we can move forward with smart infrastructure policy that lowers barriers to acquiring and deploying spectrum, then rural Americans will win, and all Americans will win, as communities in rural areas begin to grow faster and contribute more to the national economy, and as the U.S. Treasury earns more funds from the public’s spectrum resources. This is WISPA’s policy agenda, broadly stated, and we invite everyone interested in the future of rural broadband – and competition everywhere – to join us. m Spectrum is Critical Infrastructure By Claude Aiken, WISPA President and CEO Claude Aiken, WISPA President & CEO Winncom Booth #435 Stop by Winncom booth to enter to win one of two great prizes: a Ring Alarm Whole-Home Security System (drawing on Wednesday) or an Arlo Pro by NetGear Security System with Siren (drawing Thursday).