NSC's Joe Kochan: Unlocking new tech possibilities with spectrum

Spectrum is some of the most valuable technology real estate in the world, and everyone needs access to it. In fact, spectrum is "intermeshed, not only with the sort of day-to-day needs and major sectors of the economy – energy, transportation, health care, public safety, defense – but it can't happen without the participation of those entities as well," says Joe Kochan, the new executive director of the National Spectrum Consortium (NSC).

Kochan, a telecom veteran and former CEO of US Ignite, aims to promote stronger tech partnerships between government, academia and industry. His new gig is all about helping the telecom industry speed up how it develops and tests new technologies by helping make the conversations about spectrum use happen.

The government owns and controls most spectrum in the US, but "the innovation doesn't come from the government," Kochan explains in a Light Reading interview. "The government can define the problem, the government can set the rules, the government can fund the R&D. Ultimately, they rely on industry and academia to say, 'We think we have some solutions'."

In the interview, Kochan expands on the possibilities that can be unlocked by evolving spectrum access and how this new role draws from much of the experience he has in public-private partnerships from his time at US Ignite.

Related stories and links:

• National Spectrum Consortium adds new exec director (press release)
• Spectrum-sharing task force chair: 'It really doesn't have to be a spectrum fight'
• US military wants to run medical procedures over AR, 5G
• National Spectrum Consortium (website)
• Light Reading Podcast news, analysis and opinion

— Phil Harvey, Editor-in-Chief, Light Reading