FWA and the Urban Digital Divide

The end of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) put the kibosh on the business plans of internet service providers (ISPs) working to tackle the urban digital divide. I’m aware of a several ISPs working to bring broadband to neighborhoods where the majority of customers qualified for the $30 ACP discount. These business plans only made sense because a chunk of the revenue was guaranteed by ACP. I’ve been brainstorming with communities about alternatives to ACP, and I’m starting to think that perhaps fixed wireless access (FWA) cellular service is the next best alternative. Deploying FWA on a significant scale means making new investments. I can’t imagine that cellular carriers are interested in making investments in infrastructure and marketing costs to sell FWA broadband in low-income neighborhoods. Expanding an FWA network means constructing new cell sites, probably small cell sites, and involves getting fiber backbone to new sites. But I can picture various kinds of partnerships between a City and cellular carriers that might work.