The Internet of Things (IoT) has huge potential to improve the way we live and work, but this promise isn’t going to be automatically fulfilled. It will take a concerted effort from the whole telecoms industry to make it come true.

One of the key building blocks is access to spectrum under the right terms and conditions. There is a need for greater harmonisation of licensed band choices. Having to implement fewer bands lowers device cost, which in turn lowers the bar for mass-market acceptance.  And make no mistake, cost of terminals combined with battery life is what will make or break many IoT apps.

In Europe, CEPT, the coordinating body for European telecom regulators, has started looking at using parts of the 700 MHz band, while in the United States a newly proposed senate bill would direct the FCC to look at whether there is enough spectrum to handle continued IoT growth.

There are already examples where the uncertainty regarding the availability of spectrum is known to have discouraged investment – in the industrial automation sector, for example. If we can create an environment of increased certainty regarding spectrum, then it should provide an incentive for faster growth.

To make this happen, to make the most of mobile technologies, there is a case for “earmarking” spectrum for IoT applications. This not only would provide the necessary bandwidth required, but also safeguard the performance of networks with high demands on reliability, for which shared spectrum might not be seen as sufficient.

This doesn’t necessarily mean restricting use to IoT exclusively, but could identify default spectrum bands for such applications. Advantages with this approach includes clarity for manufacturers on what bands to develop devices for; reduced equipment costs; improved quality of service; and an opportunity to migrate existing LPWA services to a standards-based ecosystem. However, the earmarking of spectrum shouldn’t be done without carefully considering some potential downsides, including the possibility of spectrum going unused and a business case that isn’t attractive enough for mobile operators.

Irrespective of what happens going forward, it’s clear regulators should have IoT and machine-to-machine applications on their minds going forward. Great progress is already being made on technologies such as Narrow Band IoT (NB-IoT) and LTE Machine Type Communication 1 (Cat-M1), so it would be very short-sighted if there wasn’t enough spectrum to help them maximise their potential.