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Spectrum Sharing Works for Rural America
Spotty service, dead zones, and limited access to high-speed mobile internet continue to frustrate millions of rural Americans where the nation’s Big Three mobile carriers have not built out 5G networks – despite sitting on huge swaths of exclusive 5G spectrum licenses. Fortunately, when it comes to addressing the rural digital divide, policymakers have a better option: Dynamic spectrum sharing can provide efficient and affordable connectivity in the communities that need it most.
For years, the Big Three claimed that more exclusive, full power licensing would unleash 5G across rural America. But despite big promises – and big stockpiles of exclusive spectrum licenses – the big carriers haven’t followed through with the investments needed to bring 5G service to rural communities. Now, alternative network owners are filling those gaps by employing shared and unlicensed spectrum to deliver more competitive options tailored to local needs.
- Rural communities have a growing need for wireless connectivity, both to improve basic services like healthcare and education, but also to empower rural businesses with things like precision agriculture, livestock monitoring, and supply chain management.
- Dynamic sharing technology enables emerging competitors to share spectrum, reducing spectrum costs, which makes serving rural areas more commercially viable and allows providers to charge less for their service.
- Dynamic sharing in the Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) band is already working and helping the small wireless internet providers deliver reliable, high-speed broadband services to millions of residents, small business owners, and anchor institutions in rural areas.
Spectrum Sharing Snapshot: Wireless Internet Service Provide – local2u West Virginia
The Failure of the “Big Three” to Help Rural America – and the Path Forward Through Spectrum Sharing
Rural dead zones are a buildout problem, not a spectrum problem. More spectrum in the hands of the Big Three will not connect rural coverage gaps.
- Mobile dead zones have just one cause: The Big Three’s failure to invest in putting the necessary equipment in the areas that need it most.
- Rural dead zones will continue until the Big Three finally invest to densify their networks, which would instantly generate new capacity.
- Carriers could substantially increase their spectrum efficiency through innovation alone – without needing any additional bandwidth allocations – according to their own equipment suppliers, Ericsson and Nokia.
Experts Weigh in: How Spectrum Sharing Helps Rural America
Dean Bubley, a wireless telecommunications expert and the Founder & Director of Disruptive Analysis, explained how spectrum sharing is essential for rural networks in a September 10 column published by Agri-Pulse, a leading source of agriculture and rural policy news. Read the full column here.
“There is an irony here – the mobile industry often has very high urgency to see spectrum auctions rushed through, but then the complete opposite – a remarkable lack of urgency – to deploy that spectrum in rural areas. This is why continued support and evolution of shared spectrum and coexistence, like CBRS and AFC-enabled 6GHz, is critical for rural users.”