STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN JULIUS GENACHOWSKI Re: Review of Foreign Ownership Policies for Common Carrier and Aeronautical Radio Licensees under Section 310(b)(4) of the Communications Act of 1934, as Amended, IB Docket No. 11-133 Today, we take another step in the FCC’s agency-wide regulatory reform efforts, focused on eliminating unnecessary regulations, and improving the transparency and predictability of the Commission’s work. This is an effort that goes back to the first day of my tenure. And we have made substantial progress on regulatory reform. We’ve already eliminated more than 50 unneeded regulations, and we’re working toward eliminating 25 unnecessary data collections. We’ve removed, or are in the process of removing, outmoded restrictions on spectrum use, including in the WCS, BRS, and EBS bands – and, this morning, we eliminated needless restrictions on wireless backhaul. In our white spaces proceeding last year, we removed restrictions in order to free up the largest amount of unlicensed spectrum in 25 years. We’ve moved to reduce regulatory barriers to broadband build-out in connection with tower siting and pole attachments. We’ve also taken steps to reduce burdens on broadcast radio licensees by allowing them to rely on previous technical filings instead of having to submit a whole new set of filings. And we’ve begun eliminating the requirements to submit most of the reports currently collected on international communications, which will remove reporting requirements from hundreds of small businesses. Our work over the past years has been consistent with the President’s January Executive Order on improving regulation and regulatory review. When the President issued an Executive Order in July asking independent agencies to comply with the basic substance of the January Order, I welcomed it. And last week I was pleased to say to FCC staff that we would comply with the request in the Executive Order, and that we would perform our responsibilities consistent with the Order. I’d like to thank Ruth Milkman for heading up our efforts on regulatory reform – and also for her blog post this morning with more detail on steps forward. I’m grateful to Ruth as well as Marius Schwartz, Austin Schlick, and Jessica Almond for ensuring that our processes and analyses continue to be consistent with the very best practices in government, and that they promote innovation, investment, and competition; benefit our economy; and benefit consumers. In today’s NPRM, we continue these efforts by proposing to eliminate unnecessary reporting obligations on U.S. wireless companies that have some foreign shareholders. We estimate that this will mean a 70 percent reduction in the number of foreign ownership filings by affected companies, and also significantly reduce the time and cost of each filing. It will also provide greater certainty and transparency regarding the Commission’s requirements and review process for wireless common carrier and satellite applicants. The Commission now has no rules clearly explaining the information it requires from these applicants when they seek approval of their foreign ownership. Adopting the approach we propose would increase transparency and predictability for companies seeking to invest in the United States. Importantly, we propose to do this in a way that ensures we can meet our obligations regarding national security, law enforcement, and other issues involving foreign licensees. We will continue to collect all information needed to protect U.S. national security, law enforcement, foreign policy, and trade policy interests. This NPRM originated with the staff of the International Bureau, which developed and drove the proposed reforms based on their many years of experience with foreign ownership reviews. I thank them for their good ideas and hard work on this item.