telecompetitor

The latest Microsoft Airband partner is Watch Communications, which will work with Microsoft to bring high-speed broadband to 50 counties in IN, 22 counties in IL, and most counties in OH. The Microsoft Watch Communications partnership will use a variety of broadband technologies, with an emphasis on fixed wireless operating in TV white spaces. TV white spaces technology uses vacant TV broadband spectrum, incorporating database technology to ensure that broadband providers only use spectrum that is available for unlicensed use in a geographic area.

As the US gets set to ban certain Chinese manufacturers from selling telecommunications equipment to US service providers, CoBank is warning that rural Americans’ access to communications services could be damaged if insufficient funding is available for rural service providers to replace prohibited equipment already installed in their networks.

The Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Development received 53 applications requesting more than $635 million in loan-grant combination funding in the first round of the USDA ReConnect Pilot Program. The USDA made $200 million available for loan-grant combination projects in the first round of funding. The applications came from rural areas across 33 states, representing 1,099 farms and 859 businesses. Though the loan-grant application process is closed, the government will still accept applications for low-interest loans through July 12.

As the Federal Communications Commission gets set to address inadequacies with the way broadband availability data is collected from service providers, USTelecom is warning that those efforts are only part of the solution to broadband mapping problems. To know which US homes and businesses do not have broadband available to them, we also need to know the exact geographic coordinates of those homes and businesses. And perhaps surprisingly, that information doesn’t exist, explained Mike Saperstein, vice president of policy and advocacy for USTelecom.