Is the $20 Billion RDOF Budget Big Enough? Expert Panel Says Yes, Though Some May Disagree

Is the $20 billion budget allocated by the Federal Communications Commission for the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) enough to meet rural broadband deployment goals? All three experts on a webinar presented by the Fiber Broadband Association (FBA) not only said yes — they said the RDOF budget, in combination with state funding and private investment, would be sufficient to meet deployment goals using fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) technology.  A study commissioned by the FBA in 2019 estimated the incremental cost of making FTTH available to 90% of US homes at $70 billion over the next 10 years. At $20 billion over the same time period, the RDOF budget would only cover a portion of those costs. But according to Sam Kornstein, vice president of strategy and analytics for Cartesian, the research firm that conducted the FBA study, that’s not a problem. Getting to the 90% mark “wouldn’t require $70 billion of public funding,” said Kornstein. The FCC’s role is to provide “just enough support where it creates a positive business case for the private sector to do the rest.”