Seminar o politici radiofrekvencijskog spektra u Srbiji
Workshop on Radio Spectrum
Management in Serbia
7-8 November 2006
Belgrade

ROBERT HORVITZ
Open Spectrum Foundation

 Evolution of radio regulation
 Licensed/license-exempt
 Critique of traditional spectrum management and the search for alternatives
 Spectrum access rights continuum
 COFFEE

Intercity networks of manned signalling towers built in
France, Germany, England,
Sweden, Norway, Spain, etc.,
(1793-1840)
– To relay current intelligence
& urgent orders
– Expensive but of great value to military, police, diplomats
– Helped extend & consolidate government influence

A Government/Military monopoly
“National security asset”
– Like Post Office, but Government the main – or only - user
– Use by private citizens limited by law or cost
Fortunately, 19 th century Governments did not declare the visible spectrum to be a “scarce natural resource” that must be controlled by the State to protect optical telegraph communications.

Ofcom Spectrum Efficiency Scheme
Technical Study
Higher Frequency bands for Licence Exempt
Applications
– Contract awarded to Quotient Associates Ltd.
"A key outcome from this study is to answer the question as to whether all spectrum above a particular frequency should be licence-exempt and if so, what this frequency should be...
“End date: December 2006"

Final Report of the FCC Spectrum Policy Task
Force’s Unlicensed Devices and Experimental
Licenses Working Group, 2002:
[Above 30 GHz] “the physics of this band are so different than lower bands as to bring into question most of the fundamental precepts of radio regulation... While licensing is the general presumption at lower frequencies, the physics of these frequencies appear to justify a de novo approach... It may well be reasonable to question whether unlicensed use should be a major type of use in these higher bands, rather than one restricted to a small set of bands...”

Inspired Samuel F. B. Morse
Influenced European governments’ attitudes toward the Electric
Telegraph, which were inherited by
Telephony and Wireless Telegraphy
(Radio)

Government monopolies all over Europe
– Post Office model
– No foreign ownership allowed
– Morse excluded even where he had the patent
Morse himself favored government monopoly
– Offered US Post Office exclusive right to create a national network
– Postmaster General said no
• His assessment: telegraphy could never be profitable “under any rate of postage”
So Congress rejected Morse’s offer

Regulation began at international level, with a 1849 treaty between Austria & Prussia
1865: mesh of bilateral and regional treaties combined to create the International
Telegraph Union.
1885: Telegraph Union treaty amended to include international telephony
– National autonomy in arrangements for domestic telephony

First motive for regulating radio was not to prevent overuse of a limited resource
First motives were to:
– Change the service conditions imposed by
“dominant market power” Marconi
– Improve the safety of life and property at sea
– Establish government authority to license ship radios operating outside national territory
Preventing interference a secondary issue

Marconi Wireless Telegraph Co. Ltd. would not sell equipment or intercommunicate
– Service contract required all messages to be sent and received only by their employees
Special relationship with British Government
– To expand British naval & undersea cable dominance?
– Transoceanic communication crucial to every country’s markets, colonial ambitions

Coastal and shipboard stations required “to exchange radiograms without distinction of the radio system adopted...”
– 9 of the 27 countries signing the Convention added this reservation:
• Intercommunication not required in countries with at least one station which accepted all messages

“No station on shipboard shall be established or worked by private enterprise without authority from the Government to which the vessel is subject. Such authority shall be in the nature of a license issued by said Government.”
Coastal stations handling “public correspondence” must be licensed, but Governments “preserve their entire liberty” with regard to licensing other types of stations.

Government stations generally exempt from the provisions of Convention
– except for rules about minimizing interference & responding to radio calls for help

“The choice of wireless apparatus and devices to be used by the coastal stations and stations on shipboard shall be unrestricted.
The installation of such stations shall as far as possible keep pace with scientific and technical progress...
“The working of the wireless telegraph stations shall be organized as far as possible in such manner as not to disturb the service of other wireless stations...”

From Telegraphy:
– Treatment as a “national asset”
– Tradition of government control
From Telephony:
– Principle of “national autonomy” in domestic implementations

"No transmitting station may be established or operated by a private person or by any enterprise without a license issued in an appropriate form and in conformity with the provisions of these Regulations by or on behalf of the government of the country to which the station in question is subject."

“Collective Use of Spectrum” Consortium

"We further encourage innovative approaches to managing the spectrum resource such as the ability to share spectrum or allocating on a license-exempt non-interference basis... We recommend that regulators carefully consider how to minimize licensing hurdles..."
---Best Practice Guidelines for the Promotion of Low Cost
Broadband and Internet Connectivity

Trends in Telecommunication Reform:
Licensing in an Era of Convergence
(ITU, 2004)
"...more and more policy-makers are questioning the utility of licensing and demanding that licences be adapted to achieve policy goals without hindering market development... The allocation of spectrum for licence-exempt use is increasingly viewed as a catalyst for the development of more efficient and cost-effective wireless technologies. By late 2004, 55 countries had allocated spectrum for unlicensed use..."

“The least onerous authorisation system possible should be used to allow the provision of electronic communications...”
“General authorization” the preferred option
“Individual license” only when
“unavoidable” and “objectively justified”

Denmark: gradually since 1997
Sweden: VHF use by private boats since
2006
Netherlands: de-licensing “some” radio equipment in “near future”
UK: proposed, but postponed
Australia, New Zealand, USA - already

License tenders - but no trading or transfers
– “The presence of secondary markets makes it more profitable for licensees to be spectrum efficient...”
“Rational... Efficient... Economical...”
What do these mean in practice?

RIGID
– Good in times of slow change
– Inefficient in times of fast change
CONSERVATIVE
– Good in times of frequency abundance
– Costly in times of frequency shortage
Blocks new approaches to band-sharing
– Underlays, Overlays, Ultra-Wideband

Cost of mis-allocating spectrum
Estimated loss to US economy:
in higher operating costs and delayed/forbidden/unrealized wireless services
$77 billion is 260 times the FCC’s annual budget...
(but only 0.6% of US Gross Domestic Product)

“Multi-Band, Multi-Location Spectrum Occupancy
Measurements” by Mark A. McHenry and Dan
McCloskey (ISART, 2006)

1 . Licensed access
2. License-free access
3. A “continuum” of access rights
based on device performance
“scorecard”
(Can performance-based access rights co-exist with paid entry?)

Robert Horvitz bob@openspectrum.info
OPEN SPECTRUM FOUNDATION
Amsterdam/Prague http://www.openspectrum.info/