‘New Reality’ of Spectrum Sharing Requires Innovative Technology, NTIA’s Strickling Says
Spectrum sharing is the “new reality” and is the only way U.S. industry and government agencies will be able to meet their long-term spectrum needs, said NTIA Administrator Larry Strickling Tuesday at a joint NTIA-National Institute of Standards and Technology event. Strickling and members of other federal agencies highlighted the importance of developing new technologies to make spectrum sharing as effective as possible. He urged stakeholders not to dismiss spectrum sharing as a “perfectly hopeless notion,” noting that in the 1920s then-Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover predicted that wireless telecom would work only as a means for mass communication, not for individual conversation. “Hoover failed miserably at predicting the future of wireless communications and the lesson we should all draw from that is that none of us will ever quite know where technology will take us in the end,” Strickling said.
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NTIA has already made “good progress” in freeing up spectrum, having identified 405 MHz of spectrum for reallocation, he said. Strickling said he hopes FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler will be able to bring to completion the agency’s work to bring spectrum on the 5 GHz, 3.5 GHz and 1755 MHz bands to market. NTIA is also seeking additional federal spectrum on bands below 6 GHz that are good candidates for spectrum sharing, but both public and private stakeholders will need to work together “to achieve improved efficiencies by maximizing sharing of our valuable spectrum resources,” he said.
Federal agencies and industry will need to address the use of information sharing, divulging operational information that is necessary to fostering spectrum sharing, but is also usually proprietary and confidential, Strickling said. The Department of Defense and industry representatives used nondisclosure agreements to exchange this information as they worked on reallocating the 1755 MHz band, but the Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee plans to discuss a “simpler and more predictable approach” at a Dec. 13 meeting, he said.
NIST and NTIA are also working to improve research and testing resources related to spectrum sharing as part of their response to President Barack Obama’s June spectrum sharing memo, Strickling said. The memo tasked NIST and NTIA with publishing an inventory of federal test facilities and developing standards and best practices to enhance spectrum sharing research and development (CD June 17 p1). The agencies published an initial inventory in June and have jointly formed the Center for Advanced Communications to provide infrastructure and resources to foster public-private collaboration on spectrum sharing issues, said NIST Director Patrick Gallagher. The center will effectively be a “single focal point” for engaging industry and federal agencies on spectrum sharing issues, said Jason Boehm, NIST director-Program Coordination Office.
Obama believes spectrum sharing is one of the most important things affecting the U.S. economy -- and the White House has tried to be a catalyst through the memo, said Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Jason Furman. Along with making $100 million in funding commitments, the memo created a Spectrum Policy Team, which will publish a report by June on how NTIA and the FCC are incorporating spectrum sharing into their spectrum management policies. The memo did not in itself create new authority, but it “does have a way of focusing everyone’s attention” on spectrum sharing, said Tom Power, Office of Science and Technology Policy deputy chief technology officer-telecommunications.
The event included an exhibition of new spectrum management technologies from Google, Microsoft, Qualcomm and others. Additional participants were Adaptrum, Cantor Fitzgerald, Corning, Dynamic Spectrum, the Idaho National Laboratory, the Illinois Institute of Technology Wireless Networks and Communications Research Center, InterDigital, New York University’s Polytechnic Institute, Nokia Solutions and Networks, Shared Spectrum, Silicon Image and xG Technology. New developments in spectrum sharing technology all stem from robust research and development programs, said Andrew Clegg, the National Science Foundation program director-Enhancing Access to the Radio Spectrum. EARS, which NSF established after Obama issued his first spectrum memo in 2010, has distributed $47 million in funding through 66 research grants focusing on spectrum efficiency, Clegg said. “Just about everything” EARS has funded so far is relevant to the spectrum sharing domain, he said. EARS plans an additional grant competition in FY 2014, which Clegg said should include at least $14 million in grants. NSF will post an official solicitation for applications by early January, he said.