Growing Unlicensed Spectrum, Growing the Wireless Economy

[Commentary] Why does the coming crush in unlicensed spectrum matter? For starters, the unlicensed economy represents economic growth.

Today, unlicensed wireless devices contribute between $16 billion and $37 billion to our economy annually. To put that in perspective, that is more than Americans spend on milk and bread each year, combined. Finally, the unlicensed economy is critical for Internet connectivity. Now, through Wi-Fi, more than one half of wireless data connections are offloaded onto unlicensed spectrum. So, while the 2.4GHz band continues to service us well, it is getting mighty congested. If we get our unlicensed spectrum policies right, we can seriously expand Wi-Fi opportunities. At the same time, making more unlicensed spectrum available can give a jolt to the coming Internet of Things and machine-to-machine communications. But above all, the time to act is now -- and expanding unlicensed service in the 5.1GHz band is a great place to start.