June 2011

Why is European broadband faster and cheaper? Blame the government

Why are Internet speeds and prices better in the Netherlands and the UK than in the United States? The government. Not government spending. The UK's administration hasn't invested a penny in broadband infrastructure, and most of the network in the Netherlands has been built with private capital. (The city government in Amsterdam took a minority stake in the fiber network there, but that's an investment that will pay dividends if the network is profitable -- and the private investors who own the majority share of the system plan to make sure that it will be.) The game-changer in these two European countries has been government regulators who have forced more competition in the market for broadband.

Spain Starts Wireless-Spectrum Sale to Raise $2.9 Billion to Trim Deficit

Spain kicks off its first wireless- spectrum auction June 29, a sale aimed at raising 2 billion euros ($2.9 billion) as the government races to rein in the euro area’s third-largest budget deficit.

Telefonica, Vodafone Group, and France Telecom are among 11 phone companies participating in the auction of 270 megahertz for mobile services. Operators will bid for 58 blocks in the 800-MHz, 900-MHz and 2.6-gigahertz frequency bands. “This will be very significant for Spain’s aim to meet its deficit target at the end of the year,” said Jose Carlos Diez, chief economist at Intermoney Valores in Madrid. “It will also be a good booster for country’s competitiveness so that it’s not left behind compared with other European counterparts.” Final results of the auction, which starts at noon Madrid time, will be known in 10 to 15 days. The Madrid-based ministry will post daily results on its website, indicating the price and the blocks auctioned, without providing the name of the operators. The auction is aimed at boosting competition, including helping reduce prices and increasing quality, by giving smaller operators more access to mobile-phone frequencies, the ministry said in April.

Nexstar Buy of Liberty Stations Gets FCC OK

The Federal Communications Commission approved Nexstar Broadcasting's purchase of WFRV Green Bay-Appleton (WI)(DMA 71), and WJMN Escanaba (MI)(DMA 179), extending a waiver of the "main studio" rule so that Nexstar can continue operating WJMN without a studio.

Nexstar agreed to buy the two CBS affiliates last April from Liberty Media Corp. for $20 million. The studio waiver is based in part of Escanaba's economic decline, the FCC says in a letter approving the deal and continues "Nexstar has demonstrated that it will take measures to ascertain the needs of the local community and to make it convenient for the listeners in the community to communicate with the local station by toll-free number."

Stealth Internet helps get images, messages out of troubled areas, but proves less useful for protests

Advanced technology that keeps dissidents online during state-sponsored Internet blackouts can help the rest of the world stay informed about and engaged in a faraway struggle against an autocratic regime, but it may be less useful at keeping protest movements on track.

The Internet in a suitcase -- which provides access to a stealth Web, via satellite, and is designed to be smuggled into areas where the Internet either has not penetrated or has been shut off by authorities -- is just one of several new State Department-funded tools. All are centered on ensuring stable Internet and mobile access for dissidents in autocratic states and helping them circumvent government censorship. Portable Internet technologies have been in development for a long time, mostly for aid organizations to set up communications in disaster areas where the Web has been knocked out or where there has been low penetration, according to Robert Guerra, director of Freedom House's Project on Internet Freedom.

Groups Ask FCC To Hold Hearings on AT&T Takeover Of T-Mobile

Seven public-interest and consumer groups asked Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Julius Genachowski to hold public field hearings on AT&T’s proposed takeover of T-Mobile.

“Holding hearings would be consistent with the Commission’s recent actions to increase public participation in its proceedings. In fact, the Commission has previously held field hearings about proposed mergers and other topics that greatly impact consumers,” said the letter, which was signed by Public Knowledge, Consumers Union, Free Press, Future of Music Coalition, Media Access Project, National Hispanic Media Coalition and the Open Technology Initiative of the New America Foundation. Chairman Genachowski has said the FCC wants to be a leader in harnessing communications and technology to improve public participation, the letter noted, adding: “But as the Commission realizes, online participation is not enough—particularly when millions of Americans do not have adequate broadband access. Therefore, public hearings will provide an opportunity for all stakeholders to provide their input directly to the Commission.”

Why the GPS industry needs to work with LightSquared

LightSquared faces a tough task. It not only has to find a fix for the interference problems its long-term evolution (LTE) creates for GPS, but it has to convince the FCC, the GPS device industry, government agencies and now lawmakers that its solution will work.

The burden of proof definitely weighs heavily on the wholesale operator. But both the government and the GPS industry have every incentive to work with LightSquared to find that fix. For GPS device makers, the incentive is one of pure business interest: The mobile broadband networks LightSquared and other operators build will ultimately make their products more powerful and more useful. The advent of 3G sparked a revolution in GPS and location, providing a two-way data channel that added real-time context and information to mapping and location data. Assisted GPS in smartphones and feature phones has spawned a huge location-based services sector.

As mobile broadband scales, the potential exists for any conceivable consumer device to become connected wirelessly. We're seeing it with laptops and tablets today. Soon we'll see it in cameras, game consoles, digital media players and automobiles. In the vertical markets, agricultural and construction equipment, shipping containers, trucks and any manner of high-value industrial asset are being outfitted with machine-to-machine modules (M2M). As all of these mobile devices gain access to real-time information, their location context will become all the more important—a huge boon for the GPS industry.

But in order to support those billions of mobile broadband connections, the wireless industry is going to have to build a lot more networks over a lot of spectrum that wasn't originally designated for cellular use. To get that kind of ubiquitous mobile broadband coverage, the FCC will have to clear not just the satellite L-band for wireless, but government and broadcast bands—by some estimates operators need to quintuple current spectrum resources to support the expected demand for mobile data. Regulators will have to scour the electromagnetic spectrum up and down to find new frequencies. Interference issues will abound and incumbent licensees are sure to protest. The LightSquared ordeal is a harbinger of things to come.

Baby's death spotlights safety risks linked to computerized systems

A look at the safety risks associated with medicine's advance into the information age, a trend being pushed aggressively under health reform.

The federal government is aiding the shift with $23 billion in incentives to medical providers who buy electronic medical records or computerized systems that automate drug orders and other medical processes. The hope is that these technologies will enhance access to vast amounts of information tucked away in paper files and meaningfully improve medical care. Doctors should be able to see test results quickly and communicate more easily with each other, for example. And electronic safeguards can remind physicians about recommended medical practices or alert them to harmful interactions between medicines. Yet with these sizable potential benefits also come potential problems. Hospital computers may crash or software bugs jumble data, deleting information from computerized records or depositing it in the wrong place. Sometimes, computers spew forth a slew of disorganized data, and physicians can't quickly find critical information about patients. Meanwhile, different electronic systems used in hospitals may not be able to communicate, and the alerts built into these systems are often ignored because they are so frequent and often are not especially useful, physicians and other experts report.

Meaningful Use Final Rules a 'Roadmap' Not a Checklist, Mostashari Says

Look for the Office of the National Coordinator to release by next year all of the final rules for Stage 2 of meaningful use.

Farzad Mostashari, MD, the National Coordinator for Health IT, explained that his office is busy reviewing information from the Health IT Policy Committee, which in early June recommended delaying for a year, until 2014, Stage 2 of the meaningful use program for those providers that comply with Stage 1 criteria in 2011. Without being specific, Mostashari said that while the final rules will pull from the policy committee recommendations, "they will not be identical," although "a lot of deference will be given to the committee." Mostashari challenged the audience to not think of meaningful use as a random bureaucratic checklist of hoops to jump through, but rather "the roadmap for delivering higher quality healthcare." He said the mindset is shifting from seeing meaningful use as a distraction from providing quality patient care to the "way to get there."

Sprint’s Hesse Fires ‘Nukes’ in 18-State Push to Stop AT&T

Dan Hesse’s White Room is closely guarded even within Sprint Nextel Corp. The chief executive officer carries the only key and draws black curtains over his scribblings before leaving. This is where Hesse retreats to map out “nukes” in red, blue and green ink, lately his tactics for stopping AT&T Inc.’s proposed takeover of T-Mobile USA.

“Clearly, purely, we want to win and block the merger,” said Hesse, during an interview at the company’s Overland Park, Kansas headquarters. “This one poses real risks.” Hesse has already thrown personal and corporate resources at blocking AT&T. He tripled the amount of time he’s spending on government affairs, testifying before Congress and making regular trips to Washington. Sprint is organizing industry opposition and filed a 377-page dissent with the Federal Communications Commission. The company even tapped its own engineers to show AT&T how to get more capacity from its wireless network so it wouldn't need to buy T-Mobile. Hesse is just getting started. He’s courting top technology CEOs to come out against the deal and sway public opinion. He’s working to get as many as 18 state regulators to scrutinize the purchase, which may slow down approval or prompt divestitures. He’s working on other tactics he’s not ready to disclose.

Half of US twenty-somethings have no landline

The shift away from landlines continues, as 24.9 percent of all American adults now live in homes with wireless-only voice connections. Among younger adults aged 25 to 29, the numbers are twice as high; more than half have only a cell phone. Don't feel too bad for the phone companies. The largest wireline companies, such as AT&T and Verizon, are linked with wireless units that have cashed in on the switch to cell phones and now rake in huge profits.

Benton

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