The Dynamic Spectrum Markets Workshop will be held on June 2-3, 2011, at Northwestern University. This workshop will bring together experts in wireless networking, wireless communications, economics and public policy to address the design and deployment of dynamic markets for improving the utilization of wireless spectrum. Topics to be covered in the workshop include the technical advances that could better facilitate spectrum markets, the technical restrictions that should be placed on spectrum users, and the type of market mechanisms that are appropriate for running such a market. The expected outcome of the workshop would be to establish a multidisciplinary research agenda for designing future dynamic spectrum markets, and contribute to the development of techniques for enhancing the access to radio spectrum and better supporting current and new applications. Participants will be selected based on an open call for white papers as well as there being invited participants.
This Grant helped to support participants to travel to a workshop entitled "Spectrum Markets: Challenges ahead," which was held at Northwestern University on June 2-3, 2011. The workshop was also supported by the Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science (CMS-EMS) at Northwestern and the MS in Information Technology (MSIT) program at Northwestern. It is widely accepted that there is insufficient spectrum available to meet the predicted demands for high-speed data over the next decade. This is due in part to inefficiencies inherent in current spectrum allocations. One proposed solution is to enable "dynamic spectrum markets" that allow spectrum to be re-allocated over short time-scales. Such approaches could leverage advances in technology that enable more flexible devices that are not tied to a single band of spectrum.The design and deployment of such markets requires more than technical advances. Fundamental policy and economic questions must also be addressed. This workshop brought together experts from across these domains to start a cross-disiplinary dialogue. The workshop had 34 participants including experts in public policy, economics, and wireless communications and networking. It consisted of a sequence of talks and panels, with ample time for extensive discussions. Talks were presented at a level suitable for a multi-disciplinary audience and highlighted some of the key issues associated with spectrum allocation.To broaden the impact from this work, materials from the workshop have been made publicly available on the workshop website.
