NEW ORLEANS-For an agency whose job it is to regulate an industry, last week at CTIA’s Wireless
’99 three of the five people sitting on the Federal Communications Commission seemed reluctant to predict where that
regulation will go in the next century.
“I don’t think the role of government is to predict where technology is
going to go … where technology is going to go will ultimately be decided by technologists and demanded by
consumers,” said FCC Commissioner Harold Furchtgott-Roth.
FCC Commissioner Susan Ness, the most
senior member of the commission, said the agency is working with the wireless industry to review rules that no longer
may be necessary because of the advancement of technology.
That technology has led to competition and this
competition means that the market will “perform functions that government used to perform,” said FCC
Commissioner Michael Powell.
The FCC’s Commissioners’ round table, held last Tuesday at Wireless ’99, was
moderated by Thomas Wheeler, president of the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association, with three of the
five FCC commissioners participating. FCC Chairman William Kennard spoke at the General Session earlier in the day
and Commissioner Gloria Tristani gave introductory remarks at the public policy panel later in the day.
Other
highlights from the second day of Wireless ’99 included a discussion between four industry leaders, moderated by
Wheeler, about the convergence of wireless technology into Internet platforms, and a speech by Kennard.
Merle
Gilmore, Motorola Inc.’s president of Communications Enterprises; John Roth, president and chief executive officer of
Nortel Networks; John Major, president and CEO of Wireless Knowledge; and Nicholas Myers, CEO of Symbian
participated in the panel discussion. Although each had differing opinions on the route their companies would take, all
agreed consumers are demanding mobile access to the full range of information they have today with their desktop
computers.
The presentation was followed by Kennard’s speech. Among others things, Kennard said he recognized
“excessive regulation will handcuff the invisible hand of competition” and he pledged the FCC would fight
anti-competitive behavior in the marketplace.
Wireless not competitive everywhere
The wireless industry is
competitive but it is not competitive everywhere, said panelists at a breakfast on Tuesday at the Wireless ’99 show.
“We need to define the markets properly. Wireless is competitive in urban markets [but not as much as in] rural
markets,” said Daniel Connors, wireless legal adviser to FCC Commissioner Susan Ness.
The sentiment was
echoed by Karen Gulick, wireless legal adviser to FCC Commissioner Gloria Tristani. “In rural America, the
cellular duopoly is still the norm,” she said.
It is this difference in the market that led to Ari Fitzgerald,
wireless legal adviser to FCC Chairman William Kennard, to give a not-so-positive preview for lifting the spectrum
cap. “We have a long way to go before we lift the cap,” he said.
CTIA has asked the FCC to lift the
spectrum cap that restricts wireless carriers from controlling more than 45 megahertz in any geographic area.
