Why the FCC Is Banning Foreign-Made Drones | Brendan Carr

Brendan Carr (0:00)

Drones is an example of this, robotics are an example of this, where we've taken actions to ban new models of foreign-produced drones, foreign-produced robotics, as well as foreign-produced routers, which are a key component of in-home internet. And what we're seeing is that action is not only important for national security, but we've seen significant new investments.

SPEAKER_2 (0:19)

All right, we're back, we're rolling. We're in DC this time, for the first time ever, outside of SF, MTS.

They let us out. They let us out, finally, with Brendan Carr, Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He's been a Commissioner of the FCC for almost a decade. And under him, the FCC is pursuing a build America agenda, streamlining permitting, cutting regulation, freedom up spectrum, advancing national security, and ensuring American leadership in all kinds of technologies. So Chairman Carr, welcome back to MTS.

Brendan Carr (0:48)

Yeah, thanks so much. Great to be here again. I love the program you guys provide, lots of interesting bite-sized pieces of information. And importantly, welcome to Washington DC. It's good to be with you.

SPEAKER_3 (0:58)

Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, it was an honor to have you as our first guest. So the first thing I wanted to ask is about the Build America Agenda, and sort of what are the priorities for somebody who might not be familiar.

Brendan Carr (1:08)

Yeah, so we actually launched the Build America Agenda outside of Washington DC. And part of the idea is that when you look at technology in terms of the different significant leapfrogging change we've seen in this country, obviously, you go to the Internet, number one.

Number two, I think you go to the mobile Internet, so smartphones, the app economy, everything that Unleashed. I think AI is going to be the third big technological change. And President Trump has been very clear that he wants America to lead the world in AI. As he put it very correctly and succinctly, whoever wins AI wins. And so at the FCC, we are running a Build America Agenda, which is designed to make sure that we have the infrastructure so that we can have all of this great next generation technology. It's traditional stuff like more spectrum so your phone works. It's permitting reform like environmental regulations, cutting massive amounts of red tape. But importantly, particularly for San Francisco and a lot of reviewers, it's about the space economy and the hard tech economy. We want to make sure that jobs are coming back to this country. And we're seeing that manufacturing and it's now expanding. We're seeing warehouses that are being converted back to build satellites, to build all sorts of drones and other hard tech. And so I think it's a real exciting time that we're turning the corner. We're seeing on-shoring, we're seeing new investments, we're seeing new jobs. We just got to make sure the policy continues to unleash that.

SPEAKER_2 (2:27)

Tell us about the FCC's new regulations on humanoid and quadruped robots. Like how does this help ensure American leadership and robotics?

Brendan Carr (2:34)

So we're doing two things. One, historically, on a bipartisan basis, Republicans and Democrats in DC, they adopted policies that just sent our jobs and sent manufacturing to all the far flung corners of the globe. And that's just not good for the country, both from a national security perspective, but also from a jobs and economic opportunity perspective.

Drones is an example of this. Robotics are an example of this, where we've taken actions to ban new models of foreign-produced drones, foreign-produced robotics, as well as foreign-produced routers, which are a key component of in-home internet. And what we're seeing is that action is not only important for national security, but we've seen significant new investments. So take drones, for example. Since we banned foreign-produced drones, we've seen something like $5 billion newly flow into US drone and related manufacturing businesses on routers. Since we banned foreign-produced routers, we had zero US companies invested in routers. Now we have something like 20 US companies that are doing this. So it's a smart policy because it tells the market, hey, over a period of years, we're no longer going to be dependent on foreign tech, but there's a transition period while new investment flows, new manufacturing comes in, so the policies are working really well.

SPEAKER_3 (3:43)

Yeah, so I wanted to ask you about something that I saw, which is plans to unlock more wireless spectrum for space operations. So what is what you would consider weird space stuff that would possibly be able to get started up if we free more spectrum?

Brendan Carr (4:00)

Yeah, well, my time out of DC, particularly in the gundo, I've seen a lot of weird space stuff, whether it's using these spacecraft to manufacture drugs that can only be made in a near zero gravity environment of space.