Telecommunication

The death of former WorldCom chief Bernie Ebbers at 78 brings back memories of the “broadbandit” era of telecoms around the turn of the century, when a bubble burst that inflicted huge damage on the industry and its investors, contributing to the rise to pre-eminence of China's Huawei today. Ebbers was sentenced to 25 years in jail in 2005, but was released in Dec 2019 on compassionate grounds to spend his final weeks with his family. He was convicted for orchestrating an $11 billion accounting fraud at WorldCom that led to the biggest bankruptcy in US history at the time.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied a legal challenge from Public Knowledge, The Greenlining Institute and other groups to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai’s 2017 rollback of certain Obama-era requirements for phone companies angling to transition off of legacy copper networks. “This is a victory for American consumers, who will benefit from faster fiber deployment and the increased availability of next-generation services,” Chairman Pai said. He has touted the deregulation as critical for allowing the transition to more advanced, IP-based networks.

Frontier Communications, the provider of telecom services in 29 states, is asking creditors to help craft a turnaround deal that includes filing for bankruptcy by the middle of March. Company executives including Bernie Han, Frontier’s new chief executive officer, met with creditors and advisers and told them the company wants to negotiate a pre-packaged agreement before $356 million of debt payments come due March 15. Frontier has been in talks with advisers about possible solutions to its $17.5 billion debt load, which has become a heavy burden as people stop using landlines.

By some accounts, about 40 percent of the world’s population relies on Huawei equipment.

On Aug 22, 2019, Sen Jon Tester (D-MT) wrote to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai expressing concern about the FCC's proposal to establish a cap on the overall Universal Service Fund (USF) budget and combine the E-rate and Rural Health Care programs under a single sub-cap.

On Oct 31, 2019, Rep Jennifer González-Colón (D-PR) wrote to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai about how the Puerto Rico Telecommunications Bureau (PRTB) filed a waiver request to suspend the requirement that carriers use the National Verifier eligibility determination system for the Lifeline communication services until the new verification program proves operations. The FCC denied the waiver request, and Rep González-Colón, while ultimately supporting the purpose of the National Verifier, urged for reconsideration from the FCC and approve the waiver request. 

On May 7, 2019, Reps Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ), Nydia Velázquez (D-NY), and Jennifer González-Colón (D-PR) wrote to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai regarding communications restoration efforts in Puerto Rico following Hurricanes Irma and Maria. "It is no secret that the cost of deploying fiber or other forms of wireline and wireless broadband access to our nation's rural and remote communities is expensive, and we have an obligation to bridge the digital divide for all communities, regardless of where they may be located.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai announced that the items below are tentatively on the agenda for the January Open Commission Meeting scheduled for Thursday, January 30, 2020: