CCG Consulting

I’ve already written about the complexity of applying for the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program grants. Unfortunately, the paperwork doesn’t stop there. There are reporting requirements both for States and for grant recipients that begin when grant funds have been awarded that ask for a lot more information than any other grant I can recall. The requirements for States matter because States will likely request much of the same information from each grant recipient.

I’m starting to wonder if big cable companies and telecom companies are assuming that a fifth Federal Communications Commissioner will soon be seated because the lobbying arms of these companies have been publishing documents that are an open plea to not regulate them. The latest comes in the form of a whitepaper from ACA Connects, which represents the mid-sized internet service provider (ISP) like Cable ONE, WOW! Internet, Mediacom, TDS, Armstrong, Hotwire, and ISPs of a similar size.

One of the more interesting requirements of the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program grant process is that States must reach out to communities and stakeholders to make sure that everybody gets a voice in setting the state grant rules. This is something that communities of all kinds should be participating in. It’s easy to think of the $42.5 billion BEAD grants as only for rural broadband.

A recent analysis of Starlink broadband speeds from Ookla gathers huge numbers of speed tests from across the country. According to the study, the US average download speeds on Starlink have improved over the last year, from an average of 65.72 Mbps in first quarter 2021 to 90.55 Mbps in first quarter 2022. But during that same timeframe, upload speeds got worse, dropping from an average of 16.29 Mbps in first quarter 2021 to 10.70 Mbps in first quarter 2022.

Leichtman Research Group (LRG) recently released the cable customer counts for the largest providers of traditional cable service at the end of the first quarter of 2022. LRG compiles most of these numbers from the statistics provided to stockholders, except for Cox, which is privately held and estimated. Leichtman says this group of companies represents 96 percent of all traditional US cable customers. The industry continues to bleed customers, losing over 1.4 million customers in the fourth quarter, up from 1.3 million customers the previous quarter.

I’ve been getting the question lately about raising broadband rates. I don’t think there is a decision that smaller internet service providers (ISPs) agonize over more than the idea of increasing prices to customers. The question is obviously being raised now due to inflation. The need for rate increases during times of inflation is basic math. If your predominant product is broadband, and if costs are rising, you either raise rates or suffer a loss of margin – there isn’t any other alternative after you have done whatever belt-tightening you might do with expenses.

It’s the time of the year when the results come out for the American Customer Satisfaction Index that asks customers to rate their satisfaction with a wide range of industries and the larger companies within those industries. This is a huge nationwide poll that ranks the public’s satisfaction with 400 large companies in 45 sectors. As has been happening for many years, the large Internet Service Providers (ISPs) come in dead last when comparing ISPs to 44 other industries. ISPs were given an overall customer service ranking of 64.

There are two interesting aspects of the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) that discuss how States might deal with parts of the country that have higher than average costs. The first provision says that in areas with high costs, a State should strongly consider using the lowest-cost technology that the NTIA has defined as capable of providing broadband speeds of at least 100/20 Mbps. The second goes further and says that a State can consider using a technology that is not considered capable of providing reliable broadband service.

The Federal Reserve recently raised its benchmark interest rate by 0.75 percent, the biggest increase since 1994. The interest rate is still low by historical standards, with the fed rate now at 1.75 percent. But there is a lot of talk among economists that the fed rate will likely increase to as much as 3.5 percent in 2022 and possibly 4 percent in 2023.

The Federal Communications Commission is still considering using broadband labels that are supposed to explain broadband to customers. This sounds like a really good idea, but I wonder if it’s really going to be effective. Some of the items included on the FCC sample label are great. The most important fact is the price. It has become virtually impossible to find broadband prices for many internet service providers (ISPs). Many ISPs, including the largest ones, only show special pricing online that applies to new customers.