LMR licensing activity growing in business-industrial sector, FCC data indicates

Business-industrial land-mobile-radio (LMR) licensing activity is tracking to reach its highest level in five years, while licensing for public-safety LMR appears to be at a level similar to recent years, according to figures from the FCC’s online Universal Licensing System (ULS) database.

With almost two months left in the year, the FCC has received 9,327 LMR licensing applications from business-industrial entities—9,007 of which have been granted by the agency. As a point of comparison, this licensing-application figure almost matches the business-industrial total of 9,447 for all of 2020.

If all pending applications are approved by the FCC and the current pace is maintained through the rest of the year, the business-industrial LMR licensing total projects to 11,047.5—a figure that would be the largest for the sector since 2016, when the FCC approved 13,945 business-industrial licenses.

While these business-industrial LMR activity of the past two years is favorable compared to the recent past, it remains near the lowest totals historically. During the first 16 years of the online ULS database, the business-industrial sector had at least 11,250 licenses approved. The FCC granted between 10,200 and 10,800 business-industrial LMR licenses each year between 2017 and 2019, and then the annual total has failed to reach the 10,000 mark during each of the past four years.

Even if all pending business-industrial LMR licensing applications are approved, the projected 2024 total—an optimistic estimation—would represent a 62.6% decrease from the all-time high total of 29,569 licenses granted during the narrowbanding-influenced year of 2012.

In the public-safety sector, the current pace of LMR licensing activity is on a remarkably steady trajectory when compared to recent years. As of Monday, the FCC had received 2,558 public-safety LMR license applications and has granted 2,511 of them.

If the 47 pending applications are approved and the current pace is maintained the rest of the year, the projected total for the sector will be 3,021.5 for 2024. Such a figure would be similar to those posted in six of the past seven years, when the number of public-safety LMR licenses has ranged between 3,000 to less than 3,200. The exception was in the pandemic-influenced year, when public-safety LMR licensing activity plummeted to an all-time low figure of 2,763.