Joan Engebretson

The New York Public Service Commission (PSC) this week stayed and suspended proceedings and requests for comment about a state law that would have required broadband providers to offer a $15 plan to low-income households. It is the second blow that the law has sustained this month, following a US Eastern District Court of New York preliminary injunction to prevent the state from enforcing the rule while awaiting a final decision on the legality of the requirement.

As policymakers consider the best way to expand broadband availability, a key question is where to set speed targets which, in turn, will impact the technology used – fiber-to-the-home (FTTH), fiber-fed copper, fixed wireless or satellite. While some people argue that any government broadband support programs should be technology-neutral, we shouldn’t be “expectations-neutral” or “outcomes-neutral,” argued Ernesto Falcon, senior legislative counsel for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The debate about plans for the 12 GHz spectrum band is not just about billionaire versus billionaire, said Harold Feld, senior vice president for Public Knowledge which is part part of a new coalition know as 5G for 12 GHz.

In a filing at the Federal Communications Commission, Charter defended itself against a group of bidders in the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) auction that have questioned Charter’s winning bid in the auction. Charter had the top bid in the auction and is poised to gain $1.22 billion to cover some of the costs of deploying broadband to unserved rural areas. Charter made its filing in reply comments in connection with the company’s request to obtain eligible telecommunications carrier (ETC) status for Alabama, New Hampshire, and Tennessee.

A research note from telecom financial analysts at MoffettNathanson Research shows the firm estimates SpaceX’s total addressable US market at full deployment at between 300,000 to 800,000 households, or less than 1% of the market. It’s a particularly noteworthy number, considering that SpaceX is poised to receive nearly $900 million from the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) to cover some of the costs of bringing broadband to unserved rural areas.

Trust between partners is critical to successful public/private broadband partnerships, said James Baller, a partner with Keller & Heckman, a law firm with a specialty in telecom. A good public/private partnership agreement addresses dozens of variables, said Baller.

The National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA), NTCA-The Rural Broadband Association, NRTC, the Wisconsin State Telecommunications Association and the Ensuring RDOF Integrity Coalition (ERIC) have asked the Federal Communications Commission to release a list of census block groups that provisionally won funding through the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) program but on which the winning bidder has defaulted.

If at least 200 MHz of point-to-point mid-band spectrum were made available for fixed wireless, the US could reduce the need to subsidize rural broadband deployments, said Claude Aiken, president and CEO of the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA). The recommendation was part of what WISPA is calling a Path to Gigabit plan, which Aiken referred to as a “holistic” approach to making broadband available throughout the US.

Two state associations representing broadband providers have asked the Federal Communications Commission to deny the long-form application filed by LTD Broadband in the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) program. LTD Broadband had the largest amount of RDOF winning bids in the program and stands to gain $1.3 billion for broadband deployments in 15 states if its long-form application is approved.

Representatives from broadband provider Nextlink met with Federal Communications Commission officials in response to a range of criticism the company has received regarding its provisional win in the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) auction. The company was one of the biggest winners in the auction and will receive $429 million for rural broadband buildouts in seven states if the FCC approves its long-form RDOF application. Nextlink has come under fire from critics who argue that the company plans to use unproven fixed wireless technology to provide gigabit speeds.