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 SEPARATE  STATEMENT  OF  COMMISSIONER  MICHAEL  J.  COPPS 
 RE:  Modification  of  Parts  2  and  15  of  the  Commission’s  Rules  for  Unlicensed  Devices  and  Equipment  Approval,  Notice  of  Proposed  Rulemaking;  ET  Docket  No.  03- 
 201. 
 Spectrum  is  becoming  more  expensive.  Desirable  spectrum  bands  are  densely  populated.  And  in  many  areas  there  is  inadequate  competition  to  incumbent  carriers. 
 The  Commission  has  a  statutory  duty  under  the  Communications  Act  to  promote  the  efficient  and  intensive  use  of  the  public’s  spectrum  resource  and  to  spur  competition  for 
 the  benefit  of  consumers. 
 One  way  of  doing  this  is  the  give  new  wireless  technologies  the  ability  to  compete  with  incumbent  carriers.  We’re  all  excited  about  the  chance  that  innovators  ranging  from 
 CLECs  to  wireless  Internet  service  providers  will  give  us  new  competition  and  new  service  in  rural  areas.  To  make  this  a  reality  we  should  have  two  goals.  First,  we  need  to 
 allow  innovators  to  use  the  tools  available  to  them  to  squeeze  the  most  out  of  the  resources  available  to  them.  Second,  we  need  to  give  new  competitors  FCC  rules  that 
 preclude  incumbents  from  acting  to  slow  innovation  or  to  injure  competition. 
 This  good  item  is  part  of  the  struggle  to  achieve  the  first  of  these  goals.  We  propose  allowing  the  use  of  new  antenna  technologies,  to  modify  equipment 
 authorization  procedures,  to  harmonize  measurement  procedures,  and  to  take  a  long  list  of  other  actions  that  we  hope  will  make  innovators  using  unlicensed  technologies  better 
 able  to  turn  great  ideas  into  consumer  benefit. 
 I  congratulate  OET  on  this  item  and  gladly  support  it. 
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