Rural Digital Fund Authorizes Eighth Round of Winning Bids

The Federal Communications Commission authorized Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (Auction 904) support for 1,345 winning bids in its eighth round of awards. The RDOF program is designed to provide funding to companies to cover some of the costs of making broadband available to rural areas currently lacking high-speed service. Winning bidders were determined through a reverse auction that awarded funding for an area to the company that committed to deploying service for the lowest level of support, with a weighting system favoring bids for higher-speed, lower-latency service. Telecompetitor reports that nearly 40 companies appear on the new RDOF authorization list, the majority of which are smaller companies, including telecom companies, electric cooperatives and others. Charter was one of the largest winning bidders in the RDOF auction, and its new authorizations come in addition to numerous others previously announced for the company. Windstream also was one of the top 10 winning bidders in the RDOF auction and also has had funding authorized previously for numerous states. The RDOF program is designed to provide funding to companies to cover some of the costs of making broadband available to rural areas currently lacking high-speed service. Winning bidders were determined through a reverse auction that awarded funding for an area to the company that committed to deploying service for the lowest level of support, with a weighting system favoring bids for higher-speed, lower-latency service.