A Time for Action

Sooner or later, everyone has a moment of clarity like the one experienced by television executive Howard Beale in the movie “Network,” when he flings open the window of his hotel room and shouts out to the world, “I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore.”

Sen. George Allen, R-Va., has already had his moment. He's tired of the incessant bickering and regulatory turf wars that he says are preventing high-speed broadband services from reaching their full potential in the U.S. But his solution to the problem is surprising: legislation that would require the FCC to increase the amount of spectrum allocated for wireless broadband devices. The bill was introduced by Allen and co-sponsor Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., at a Commerce Committee hearing in mid-January. (Discussion of the bill, originally scheduled for last month, was postponed indefinitely as a result of the Columbia space shuttle disaster.)

Allen is irritated that telephone companies aren't investing more in digital subscriber line services or working harder to bring fiber closer to the customer. And he's really ticked off that the telecom industry has lost 500,000 jobs and $2 trillion in market value over the past two years.

Allen understands that investment in a marketplace generally trails consumer demand. So he has set his sights on accelerating broadband penetration, which stands at just 11% of all households nationwide, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications & Internet Association.

And he believes his legislation is a huge step in the right direction. In a recent interview with Wireless Review, Allen said that anyone possessing “a scintilla of sense” should be able to recognize the importance of developing greater consumer demand for broadband, and he is dismayed that so few people nationwide are using the technology.

In introducing the legislation, Allen cited data from the Brookings Institute indicating that widespread high-speed Internet access would boost the nation's gross domestic product by $500 billion annually by 2006. “If you look at where this debate has been for the past several years, it's been a fight between the CLECs and the RBOCs,” Allen said. “We need to use some common sense here. When you see the road is clogged up all the time and you can't get anything done to get to the other side, you bypass it.”

A willingness to blaze new trails is something that seems to come easily to Allen, partly because it's in his bloodline. His father, the late football coach George Allen, decided in 1963 that the Chicago Bears should be playing zone defense rather than the conventional man-to-man. It was a pretty gutsy decision considering that Allen was new on the job — not to mention working under Chicago coaching legend George Halas, a man not noted for his patience — and that at the time, zone defenses were considered little more than a gimmick. The result was a National Football League championship.

Sen. Allen possesses an equally impressive penchant for innovation. In 1995, while governor of Virginia, he spearheaded the NetworkVirginia initiative, an advanced broadband network created by Virginia Tech, Old Dominion University and the Virginia Community College System to deliver Internet and intranet services throughout the state. During his gubernatorial term (from 1994 to 1998), Virginia attracted $8 billion in high-tech investment and added over 50,000 tech jobs; its technological prowess no doubt influenced Allen's 2001 appointment to serve as Chairman of the Senate's High Tech Task Force.

His broadband proposal, which was introduced Jan. 14 and dubbed the Jump-start Broadband Act of 2003, would require the FCC to set aside 255 MHz of spectrum in the 5 GHz band for wireless broadband services. According to Allen, this band is attractive for a variety of reasons. One is that it is less prone to interference, a bugaboo in the 2.5 GHz band where wireless broadband devices currently operate. Another is that Japan, Brazil, Canada and Europe all have designated the 5 GHz band for the same purpose. Should the U.S. follow suit, equipment manufacturers would be able to develop wireless broadband equipment that could be used both here and abroad.

Also, the Department of Defense owns a healthy amount of spectrum in this band, much of which isn't being used at the moment. According to sources, the legislation seeks to grant wireless broadband services such as Wi-Fi a “secondary use” designation. The theory is that in time, smart technology will develop that would be capable of identifying swaths of the 5 GHz band that aren't being used at any given moment by the DOD and allow wireless broadband devices to jump into it, without interfering with DOD equipment.

Given the country's war footing at the time this story went to press, some believe that Allen will have a difficult time getting the DOD to go along with the plan. But he said he's optimistic. “This can be solved relatively easily if people want to solve it,” Allen said. He added that neither he nor Boxer would have introduced the legislation if either thought the use of the 5 GHz band “would harm our national defense in any way.”

Of all the wireless broadband alternatives, Allen is most intrigued by Wi-Fi, which is popping up in coffee shops, airports and hotels across the country. Allen hopes that additional spectrum will spark increased demand for these services, which in turn will create additional investment in Wi-Fi and other wireless broadband technologies.

Wi-Fi is particularly attractive, Allen said, because it doesn't require hard wiring, which in turn makes it an excellent means for bringing broadband to schools and apartment buildings where wiring may be cost prohibitive. He acknowledged the current limitations of Wi-Fi — its reach is restricted to a radius of 300 feet, and its capacity tops out at about 10 Mb/s — but said that technology advances will address those limiting factors.

“Wi-Fi is still in a nascent stage,” Allen said. “Who could have envisioned even this five years ago?”

Wireless carriers were hesitant to comment on Allen's bill on the record because they had yet to see the final version, but they said they were generally supportive of Allen's effort. “With any legislation, the devil always is in the details,” one source said.

There may be a more primal reason behind why Wi-Fi is the focal point of the legislation: It is one of the telecom sector's few bright spots at the moment. “There's a lot of activity in this space right now, and I think they want to work to promote that,” a carrier source said.

Perhaps, but a spokesman for the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association suggested that the day was fast approaching when somebody would have to do something meaningful to ease the spectrum squeeze in the 2.5 GHz band. “With additional spectrum already being used for wireless voice and SMS, it's already crowded,” he said. “As new and innovative wireless services become available, we will need more spectrum to service those.”