As tunable laser transmitters and photodiodes, along with other optoelectronic gear, become more sensitive and efficient, airborne infrared will become more robust and useful. Now the FCC has auctioned off 120 megahertz of frequencies for personal communications services. Most analysis has focused on what is called the wireless market and has assumed the major competitor to PCS to be the current cellular companies. From a spectronic perspective, all this analysis is deeply misleading. Whether channeled down wires or through the air, spectrum is spectrum.
Digital wireless is a cheaper and better way of delivering service.
The market for PCS is not the cellular customer, but the one billion wireline customers in rich countries and the several billions of potential phone and teleputer customers around the globe. In pursuing these customers, the price elasticities will be dramatically positive, with various price points reachable with new wireless technologies releasing torrents of new demand and new revenues. Similarly, MCI, though avoiding the auction, created a subsidiary called MCI Metro that may seek to manage service for spectrum winners in 17 cities, again harvesting the benefits of obviated access charges. Then all these companies can use their PCS technologies to pursue customers around the world without any thought of wire. A chart created by industry analyst Herschel Shosteck illustrates the opportunity.