telecompetitor

A coalition of 11 carriers and corporations, eight industry associations and the nation’s largest port authority have sent the Federal Communications Commission an auction proposal for the Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) spectrum band that represents a middle ground between rules currently in place and a proposal submitted recently by organizations representing mobile carriers. CBRS auction plans have pitted the mobile carriers, who want larger license areas to support mobile 5G services, against those who want to use the spectrum for fixed wireless broadband and who argue

USTelecom has filed a forbearance petition with the Federal Communications Commission, asking the commission to eliminate a requirement for larger, incumbant telephone companies to offer unbundled network elements (UNEs) at regulated prices. USTelecom President and CEO Jonathan Spalter said telecom unbundling regulations currently enable competitive carriers to lease network elements – typically the copper connection between the customer and the telco central office – at “extremely low rates.” INCOMPAS, an association that represents competitive carriers, sees it differently.

The Department of Agriculture awarded Tombigbee Communications a $2.98 million grant for a rural utility broadband deployment in Alabama. Steve Foshee — president and CEO of Tombigbee Communications and its parent company Tombigbee Electric Cooperative — explained that the funding is for one of the most remote parts of a broader area that the company has targeted for broadband deployment. Tombigbee, which offers broadband under the Freedom Fiber brand, aims to deploy broadband throughout 1,000 square miles of rural Alabama where many people do not have broadband available to them at the min

Post Road Foundation, an organization funded by The Rockefeller Foundation, will fund studies in five rural communities to explore the economics of the telecom utility partnership.

When the Universal Service Administration Company (USAC) issued budget figures for the Universal Service Fund (USF) high-cost program, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai took the opportunity to blame USF funding cuts on the previous administration and attempted to drum up support for alternative budget control mechanisms proposed under his administration. The USAC budget figures show forecasted demand for rate of return carriers for the high-cost program for 2018-2019 exceeding the budget by 15.52%.

AT&T now has more than five times fewer legacy DSL customers than it did four years ago. Nevertheless, the company saw a net gain of 82,000 broadband subscribers in the first quarter, an achievement that reflects a major shift in the AT&T broadband mix. "[W]e are completing our broadband transition from DSL to IP broadband,” said AT&T Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer John Stephens. AT&T uses the term “IP broadband” to refer to services delivered over fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) and fiber-to-the-node (FTTN) infrastructure.