Innovation Without the Rules

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The Federal Communications Commission doesn’t have to issue new regulations to promote innovation; it also can promote advances in broadband and wireless services by using its bully pulpit.

That’s the message delivered today by the FCC’s Technical Advisory Council, a diverse group of private-sector telecommunications experts. The council issued its first report, a list of eight recommendations that could be implemented in months, not years.

“Each recommendation is an opportunity for the FCC to unleash new private-sector innovation and job creation, without working through traditional regulatory processes,” said council Chairman Tom Wheeler.

Wheeler knows a little bit about innovation: He’s managing director of Core Capital Partners, a venture capital firm in Washington, D.C. He also is former CEO of the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association and a serial entrepreneur.

Like previous FCC advisory councils, Wheeler’s group is looking over the horizon to see where technology is headed, but “we’re also trying to say what are the things that can be done that will have a short-term impact.”

Here are its eight recommendations:

1. Develop an awards contest for cities that are the most broadband-friendly in terms of infrastructure planning, accommodation, and permitting/approvals processes. This would be similar to the Department of Education’s Race to the Top program, except the FCC wouldn’t have money to dole out to the winners. But being recognized as a “Broadband City USA” would give a city a boost when it comes to attracting investment and economic development. The FCC could use the contest to highlight best practices for broadband infrastructure.
2. Ask President Barack Obama to issue an executive order to expedite broadband infrastructure developments on federal land and federal buildings. A single federal agency would coordinate permits for rights of way and antenna siting, and approvals would be made within 60 days. Deploying broadband infrastructure in federal buildings would relieve network congestion in urban areas, and advance the development of innovations such as micro cells and distributed antenna systems.
3. Encourage states and localities to adopt a shorter time frame for permitting co-locations on existing structures, such as hanging another antenna on a cell tower. Once the decision is made to build a cell tower, it shouldn’t take long to approve an addition, Wheeler said. If states and localities don’t expedite these approvals voluntarily, the FCC should be ready to do so by issuing a new rule, he said.
4. Be more aggressive in educating state and local officials about new technologies for deploying broadband, such as micro-trenching, putting distributed antenna systems on light poles, and directional boring. The FCC should go on a road show to highlight best practices in these new technologies.
5. Develop a Web-based communication tool that localities could adopt to provide advance notification of planned infrastructure projects. That way entities that must excavate public right-of-ways—whether it’s gas companies or electric utilities—could coordinate their activities. “It will reduce the cost of construction because you only dig once,” Wheeler said.
6. Come up with metrics beyond throughput speed to measure the quality of broadband networks. Additional performance data are important for uses such as health care monitoring, emergency services, and alarms.
7. Begin a public dialogue on how homes and businesses that now use devices that depend on circuit-switched telephone networks will transition to new Internet Protocol-enabled devices. People who rely on old technology must not be stranded during this transition, Wheeler said.
8. Convene an industry-led group to discuss ways to accelerate deployment of small-cell wireless devices, such as WiFi, in commercial and government buildings.

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