Empowering Small Businesses to Innovate in Today’s Digital Economy

On March 25, I circulated to my fellow Commissioners a draft of the Federal Communications Commission’s latest report to Congress on entrepreneurs and small businesses. Among the many pro-competitive provisions Congress adopted in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, section 257 directed the FCC to pay more attention to small business, a sector that had played little or no role in the communications industry during the decades of monopoly local telephone service. Eager to inject more competition into the industry, the authors of the 1996 Act wisely looked to the fast-moving, risk-taking culture of entrepreneurial small businesses for help and inspiration.

Opening up the telecommunications networks to new and small players, they hoped, would bring disruptive innovation and new choices for consumers. One of the biggest challenges I have confronted in my time at the Commission is facing down the false choice between investment and openness. I believe our Open Internet Order took the right approach, by protecting entrepreneurs and small businesses’ free and open access to the Internet, while also forbearing from sections of Title II like rate regulation and unbundling that might reduce network owners’ incentives to continue building out their networks and investing in new technologies like 5G. As we continue to carry out the 1996 Act’s command to promote competition and diversity, we should stay focused on how entrepreneurs and small businesses, especially businesses owned by women and minorities, can harness the power of our digital networks to disrupt, create, innovate, and ultimately drive economic growth in our country.