Keep torch bright for global leadership in mobile

[Commentary] Americans are adopting mobile broadband faster than any computing technology in history, creating more than 1.5 million new U.S. jobs and offering tremendous potential to improve education, health care and public safety.

With the American-driven mobile apps revolution and the rapid rollout of 4G mobile services, the U.S. has now regained global leadership in mobile. But we can’t rest on our laurels. We must continue to pursue a multi-prong strategy to seize the mobile opportunity and tackle the challenges. Since 2009, the Federal Communications Commission has refocused the agency on broadband. On mobile broadband, our work has changed the conversation about spectrum and helped drive robust growth and innovation in mobile. When only a fraction of Americans had smartphones, app stores were new and tablets weren’t even available, we built a Mobile Action Plan to meet the nation’s emerging spectrum challenges. And those challenges are significant: Today, there are more active mobile devices than people in the U.S. The majority of mobile subscribers have smartphones. And the need for more spectrum in the mobile marketplace — and more efficient use of spectrum — has surged. Our plan focuses on five main areas, as we modernize legacy regulations and outdated policies inherited from before the mobile broadband revolution: unleashing new spectrum, removing barriers to broadband infrastructure build-out, driving greater efficiency in networks and devices, promoting competition and empowering consumers.