Sam Clodd of WMSA Europe and Mission Control warns that spectrum loss is not inevitable, urging the AV industry to act now, engage regulators, and fight to protect critical wireless frequencies.
Spectrum debates rarely feel urgent until they become operational. For the professionals managing wireless audio on major productions, that moment has already arrived.
Sam Clodd, steering committee member at WMSA Europe and operations manager at RF licensing specialist Mission Control, doesn’t frame the issue as a future risk. She describes it as a present condition, one that has been building quietly, largely outside the view of those most affected by it.
“What was missing was the right European voice: one that genuinely represented the end-users of this spectrum, not just the industry in the abstract,” she says.
She argues that wireless coordinators, sound engineers, touring specialists - the people responsible for making RF work under pressure - have not historically been central to the regulatory conversation shaping its future. “These are the people whose work depends directly on access to this spectrum,” Clodd continues, “and they were largely absent from the decisions being made about its future.”
WMSA Europe exists to change that dynamic. Its formation reflects a recognition that fragmented input is easy to ignore, but a coordinated, technically grounded voice is not. The challenge, however, is not uniquely European. Through Mission Control’s global work, Clodd sees the same pressures emerging across multiple regions. What differs is the mechanism for influence.
“The European regulatory process has its own structure and its own timeline,” she explains, “and influencing it requires a dedicated, credible voice that speaks from within that context.”
Timing is central to that argument. The next World Radiocommunication Conference may sit in 2031, but the preparatory work is already underway. Within Europe, the 614 to 694 MHz band, long critical for wireless audio, is under scrutiny for potential reallocation to mobile broadband.
“Once that process gathers momentum, it becomes very difficult to reverse,” Clodd says. “We are in the window where evidence-based engagement can still shape the outcome.”
Regulatory signals are already visible. UK regulator Ofcom’s recent call for input on spectrum use in live events and broadcast marked an active reassessment of allocations. For Clodd, it was a reminder of how decisions are made, and how easily sectors without a coordinated response can be overlooked.
“It demonstrated exactly why a coordinated, well-evidenced response from our sector matters,” she says, noting that similar pressures are playing out globally. “We are not dealing with a distant hypothetical; the process is live.”
Operations have already adapted, not through a single disruption, but through an accumulation of constraints requiring more planning, more complexity, less tolerance for error.
“Coordination has become considerably more complex and time-intensive,” Clodd says. But that only begins to describe it. On large-scale productions, the problem is not just finding space, but managing density within it. Channel counts continue to rise while usable spectrum narrows, forcing coordinators to work with tighter margins and greater uncertainty.
What follows from that is a shift in how wireless is treated within a project. “The effects go beyond the frequency plan itself,” Clodd says. “It influences how we design systems, what equipment we can recommend, how much lead time we need, and ultimately what we can promise clients in terms of reliability.”
There is a cost to that shift, but it is rarely itemised. It sits in the additional hours of analysis, the deeper layers of contingency, and the reliance on experienced coordinators to maintain stability in environments that no longer offer it by default.
At the same time, expectations are rising. Wireless systems are enabling more ambitious productions; larger channel counts, more dynamic staging, greater performer mobility. The direction of travel is clear, even if the infrastructure supporting it is under pressure.
“Wireless technology is driving genuine innovation in live production,” Clodd says. “Shows are more ambitious, staging is more complex, the creative possibilities that wireless enables are expanding all the time. We are being asked to do more, with more channels, in a tighter spectrum window.”
Nowhere is that more visible than in live events, where high-density deployments meet unpredictable RF environments and immovable deadlines. Broadcast operates under similar constraints, particularly in outside broadcast and news gathering. Even environments that once offered stability, such as corporate venues and fixed installations, are beginning to reflect the same pressures in high-demand locations. Across all these scenarios, reliability remains non-negotiable.
“The gap between a properly coordinated system and an ad hoc one has widened considerably,” Clodd says. “As environments become more constrained, the presence of a qualified wireless coordinator should increasingly be seen not as a luxury but as a professional requirement.”
Technology has extended what is possible, but it has not changed the fundamentals. Improvements in receiver performance and spectral efficiency have helped, but they operate within fixed physical limits.
“You cannot coordinate frequencies that do not exist,” Clodd says plainly. “No amount of engineering can fully substitute for adequate spectrum.”
That reality becomes sharper when discussing alternatives to UHF. While other bands are often proposed, they do not replicate the characteristics that make UHF viable at scale, particularly in complex, high-density environments.
“The UHF band between 470 and 694 MHz remains irreplaceable for the vast majority of professional wireless audio applications,” she says. “When you are coordinating 80, 100, or 160 channels… UHF is not a preference. It is a technical requirement.”
It is also far from niche. The systems in question underpin a wide range of everyday activity, from performance and broadcast to political and public communication and incudes theatres, houses of worship, and conference centres to name but a few applications. “Wireless microphones and in-ear systems are critical infrastructure for the way public life is produced and communicated,” Clodd says.
Which brings the conversation back to representation. If wireless audio is infrastructure, then the spectrum it relies on cannot be treated as expendable without consequence. WMSA Europe’s role is to ensure that message is clearly understood, not just in principle, but in practical, evidence-based terms.
Its approach reflects that. Engagement is not limited to European-level policy, but extends to national regulators, where spectrum is allocated and managed in practice. The organisation’s structure, with representation across multiple countries, is designed to reflect how the industry actually operates.
Equally important is who is included. Alongside input from large companies, freelancers and independent coordinators form a significant part of the workforce, and their experience provides the kind of grounded evidence that policy discussions often lack.
“The lived experience of a freelance coordinator working a festival circuit or a touring production is extremely valuable,” Clodd says. “We want to ensure that experience is visible in the policy conversation.”
The instinct to adapt to constraint is strong, but Clodd challenges that framing. Accepting further spectrum loss as inevitable, she argues, is the wrong starting point. “The priority is to prevent that outcome, not to adapt to it.”
That shifts responsibility back onto the industry itself, not just at an organisational level, but at an individual one. Engagement, contribution, and visibility become part of the technical response.
“This is not a technical concern for specialists to manage quietly,” she says. “It is a question about what kind of productions, broadcasts and public events will be possible in ten years’ time.”
→ DIG DEEPER: Read the full Q&A with Sam Clodd
Top image credit: Piotr Piatrouski/Shutterstock.com