National Broadband Plan Workshop on Broadband Deployment (see summary)

National Broadband Plan Workshop on Broadband Deployment


See summary of the deployment workshop

View sessions on:
Wired
Wireless
Unserved/Underserved

Federal Communications Commission
Wednesday August 12, 2009
9:30am -- 5:00pm in 3 parts
http://broadband.gov/workshops.html

Agenda

WIRED DEPLOYMENT -- (read transcript)
9:30 a.m.
FCC Participants
• Rob Curtis, Moderator
• Steve Rosenberg
• Rebekah Goodheart
• Marcus Maher

Panel: Wired Deployment
• David Armentrout, President and COO, FiberNet
• Dallas S. Clement, EVP, Chief Strategy and Product Officer, Cox Communications
• Anthony J. (Tony) DiMaso, VP - Corporate Strategy and Development, Verizon Communications
• Monisha Merchant, Director, Product Management, Level 3 Communications
• Craig E. Moffett, VP and Senior Analyst, U.S. Telecommunications, Cable and Satellite, Sanford Bernstein
• Hunter Newby, CEO, Allied Fiber
• Marcus Weldon, CTO, Wireline Networks Product Division, Alcatel-Lucent

WIRELESS DEPLOYMENT (read transcript)
1:00 p.m.

FCC Participants
• Rob Curtis, moderator
• Charles Mathias
• Steve Rosenberg
• Nese Guendelsberger
• John Leibowitz

Panel 1: A Current View

Panel 2: Different Perspectives

UNSERVED/UNDERSERVED (see transcript)
3:30 pm

FCC Participants
• Ian Dillner, moderator
• Rob Curtis
• Steven Rosenberg
• Kris Monteith

Panel:
James J. Bruder, Jr., CEO and Chairman, MetroCast Communications (see prepared presentation)
Dave Burstein, Editor and Publisher, DSL Prime (see prepared presentation and this)
Gary W. Evans, President and CEO, Hiawatha Broadband Communications, Inc., Winona, MN (see prepared presentation)
George S. Ford, PhD, Chief Economist, Phoenix Center for Advanced Legal & Economic Public Policy Studies
Mark Gailey, President & General Manager, Totah Communications, Inc.
Brett Glass, CEO, Lariat.net (see prepared presentation)
Kenneth G. Carroll, President and Chief Operating Officer, WildBlue (see prepared presentation)
Frank Schueneman, Senior Vice President - Network Services, Windstream (see prepared presentation)

9:30 -- Wired - General
Contact:
Marcus Maher
Marcus.Maher@fcc.gov
(202) 418-2339
http://broadband.gov/ws_deployment_wired.html

The following are some of the preliminary topics that will be covered at this workshop. The FCC is inviting suggestions.

  • The state of wired broadband deployment today (last mile, middle mile, Internet backbone)
  • "Business case" factors that influence the pace of wired broadband deployment (costs, revenue opportunities, regulatory considerations)
  • How the plan should evaluate the adequacy of wired broadband deployment
  • Possibility of new wired broadband entrant
  • Future plans for wired deployment
  • Key performance metrics
  • Pole Attachments
  • Rights of Way

1:00 -- Wireless - General
Charles Mathias
Charles.Mathias@fcc.gov
(202) 418-7147
http://broadband.gov/ws_deployment_wireless.html

The following are some of the preliminary topics that will be covered at this workshop. The FCC is inviting suggestions.

  • How many bars? - What does wireless broadband deployment in the U.S. really look like today?
    • I'm thirty miles off the interstate. Do I still have a connection? Do all my apps work?
    • Do wireless broadband networks always provide robust connectivity and quality of service in cities? What are the problems?
    • Will any of today's wireless broadband networks support future volume, apps and services?
  • What drives deployment decisions?
    • If the provider is affiliated with a wireline company?
    • If the provider is independent?
    • If the provider is a start-up?
    • If the provider is a reseller?
    • If the provider covers rural areas?
  • What are the key regulatory forces that:
    • Encourage or discourage deployment?
    • Impact the availability of financing?
    • Affect the time to deployment?
  • Will innovation in technologies and applications change the way we use wireless networks?
  • Possibility of new wireless broadband entrant.
  • Future plans for wireless deployment.
  • Current and future spectrum needs.
  • Key performance metrics.

3:30 -- Unserved/Underserved Communities
Contact:
Ian Dillner
Ian.Dillner@fcc.gov
(202) 418-1191
http://broadband.gov/ws_deployment_unserved.html

The following are some of the preliminary topics that will be covered at this workshop. The FCC is inviting suggestions.

  • Relevant factors in defining and identifying "unserved" and "underserved" markets.
  • Data available to identify "unserved" and "underserved" markets.
  • Barriers that reduce or preclude broadband deployment in unserved and underserved areas (e.g., costs, revenues, regulatory barriers).
  • Consumer, provider, and government expectations for unserved and underserved areas.
  • Mechanisms unleash investment in unserved and underserved areas
  • Cost curves for targeted deployment that stimulate broader deployment
  • Identify areas that fit the statistical profile of areas usually unserved or underserved but that nonetheless are served to determine models for service
  • Cost curves for deployment in different unserved areas

What some are telling the FCC about deployment...

Motorola
Just as critical to enabling deployment of broadband systems using a variety of technologies - whether wireless, cable, fiber, or wired -- the Commission must establish appropriate incentives for network providers to invest the billions of dollars required to deploy broadband infrastructure ubiquitously across the United States, and there are four specific measures the Plan should incorporate in this regard. First, it should continue the "light touch" broadband regulatory policy that Congress mandated in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 ("1996 Act") and that the Commission has followed in the intervening thirteen years. Second, the Plan should include a recommendation that Congress adopt tax credits for broadband investments, which are essential to creating the proper incentives to deploy broadband networks in areas that may be otherwise uneconomical to serve. Third, the Plan should extend federal universal service support to broadband, a proposal that enjoys broad support. Fourth, the Plan must ensure technological neutrality in implementing broadband initiatives, so that decisionmakers are free to utilize the broadband technology that best suits their needs and that can be economically supported.

XO Communications
As the FCC implements this pro-competitive national broadband strategy - one consistent with the pro-competitive paradigm of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 the FCC should establish a regulatory framework that promotes competition on an "end to end" basis. This pro-competitive framework should cover all segments of operators' broadband networks, including last mile connections to residential and business customers and middle mile connections linking local networks to interstate backbone facilities. The FCC should also adhere to the fundamental principles of competitive and technological neutrality. Marketplace forces will promote efficient broadband growth and deployment only if fiber-based, copper-based, and other wireline technologies as well as fixed and mobile wireless technologies are permitted to compete on a level playing field. In addition, the FCC should do more to encourage intramodal competition in the provision of broadband services. The FCC should look to pro-competitive network unbundling policies implemented in other countries that have proven successful in promoting broadband deployment, and determine whether those policies can be adapted to the U.S. marketplace.

Wireless Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center
The Wireless RERC submits that the build-out of broadband networks, particularly wireless based ones, can potentially create alternative employment arrangements for people with disabilities. Unemployment rates are higher among people with disabilities, with the unemployment rate of persons with a disability in April 2009 estimated at 12.9 percent, compared with 8.4 percent for persons with no disability. Findings from the research conducted by the Workplace Accommodations RERC leads to the conclusion that opportunities for some types of Information Communication and Technology (ICT) related workplace accommodation, such as telework could be enhanced by more widespread deployment of broadband. Ultimately, the use of advanced telecommunications, access to the Internet and broadband services can contribute to the creation of more flexibility in the workplace for everyone, including increasing the potential for people with disabilities to enjoy more job opportunities as well as independent living.

Wireless Internet Service Providers Association
WISPA advocates a policy of "spectrum homesteading," whereby unlicensed spectrum would be made available on a non-exclusive basis, and those wireless providers that meet an accelerated build-out and service schedule would then obtain an exclusive license for the area. WISPA believes that this policy would promote expeditions and cost-effective service, and the prospect of obtaining an exclusive license would also increase opportunities for the provider to obtain financing. With these powerful incentives, broadband services would be deployed more quickly and more affordably in more areas of the country. WISPA also recommends that a national broadband policy should enable more affordable access to backhaul facilities. Too often, distance and a lack of competition result in costs that are too high to allow WISPs to provide affordable broadband service. WISPA has advocated higher power for TV white spaces to enable wireless backhaul on a shared basis with point-to-point uses.

Wireless Communications Association International
To realize the tremendous benefits of universal deployment and adoption of next‐generation mobile wireless broadband, WCAI recommends that America's broadband plan:

  • Recognize there is no single, homogenous broadband product market and that broadband definitions focused on "speed" do not accurately reflect consumer preferences;
  • Promote and advance the competitive market forces that already are driving broadband deployment by minimizing barriers to deployment and promoting investment, by
    • Eliminating obstacles to tower siting, pole attachments, and rights‐of-way; and
    • Assuring availability of adequate spectrum resources to meet growing demand for wireless broadband services;
  • Comprehensively reform universal service policies with a broadband paradigm as the lodestar; and
  • Promote competition in the backhaul and middle mile markets.

TDS Telecommunications Corporation
Because of their proven effectiveness, efficiency and reliability, wireline networks should continue to serve as a baseline for the Nation's broadband infrastructure. Wireline networks provide a particularly reliable platform for delivering consistent, high bandwidth performance; it is perhaps for this reason that wireline networks are used more often than any other platform for the "middle mile" to provide backhaul services. Thus, while the national broadband plan must depend upon a range of access platforms to reach the entirety of the country, wireless and satellite broadband networks are — and should be treated as — complementary to wireline networks rather than mutually exclusive, in most cases.

T-Mobile USA
T-Mobile urges the Commission to implement the following three general policy
initiatives to advance mobile broadband:

  • Identify, reallocate, and auction new spectrum suitable for commercial mobile broadband services.
  • Commit to more effective targeted oversight of the supply of certain key inputs for mobile broadband services.
  • Make a number of focused, but important, steps to help streamline the process of siting wireless network facilities.
  • Otherwise avoid unnecessary regulation in the highly competitive mobile broadband market.

REACT - Residents Engaged Against Cell Towers
As more communities come face to face with the ugly realities of wireless infrastructure, the large majority of fully informed citizens find they prefer responsible deployment of fiber optic broadband technology, which is superior to wireless technology in speed, reliability, security, durability, energy efficiency, and protections it affords people and the environment from potential hazards of low-intensity radiofrequency radiation.

Rural Telecommunications Group

  • The FCC Should Mandate Automatic Roaming and Eliminate the "Home Roaming" Exception.
  • The FCC Should Impose a Spectrum Cap and Modify Its Auction Rules to Facilitate the Provisioning of Broadband to Rural America.
  • The FCC Should Prohibit Handset Exclusivity Arrangements.
  • The FCC Should Allow Licensed Wireless Backhaul in the TV "White Spaces."

PureWave Networks
In order to ensure ubiquitous broadband coverage in our nation, the Commission and Congress should view wireless broadband as an essential tool, and should do all they can to support wireless broadband deployments, including addressing spectrum availability, tower siting and zoning issues in order to expedite wireless deployments.

National Association Of State Utility Consumer Advocates
If the FCC is to develop a sound, National Broadband Plan - in accordance with Congress' directives and Americans' broadband needs, then it must commit itself to an objective, and fundamental, reassessment of basic policy and regulatory decisions made by the agency over the past decade that have been at cross-purposes to expanding broadband deployment and subscription in the United States. Specifically, NASUCA recommends that the FCC take the following actions in conjunction with, or as part of, development and adoption of a National Broadband Plan:

  • Revisit the FCC's prior determinations that concluded that cable modem, DSL, wireless broadband and broadband over power line services are entirely "information services," and are not subject to the joint federal-state regulatory model applicable to telecommunications services under Title II of the Federal Communications Act of 1934, as amended.
  • Revisit the factual bases and policy assumptions underlying the FCC's decisions to eliminate unbundling obligations relative to fiber optic facilities, line splitting and line sharing in its 2005 TRRO decision in order to promote greater access to facilities used to provide broadband service and thereby to promote competition among providers of such services, and should reassess the cost-basis upon which such facilities are unbundled and made available to competitors.
  • Revisit the FCC's decision not to implement, at least for the time being, the Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service's 2007 recommended decision that the federal high-cost universal service fund established pursuant to 47 U.S.C. § 254 should be reformed into three funds, one of which would be tasked primarily with facilitating construction of facilities for new broadband services to unserved areas.

New America Foundation, Public Knowledge, and Media Access Project

  • Prioritize Open Fiber Networks Connecting Community Anchor Institutions. NAF et al. believes a key goal of the national broadband plan should be to deploy high capacity fiber into every community with points-of-presence (POPs) at community anchor institutions including schools, libraries, hospitals, municipal/county buildings, and public safety operations. In order to maximize the benefits of these publicly funded fiber POPs, community anchor networks must be required to provide open, wholesale access to excess capacity to any for-profit or non-profit provider - allowing the infrastructure to spur high-speed connectivity into the rest of the community.
  • The Government as a Provider of Last Resort in Unserved Rural Areas
    In many cases, particularly in high-cost and sparsely populated rural areas, even with affordable access to high-speed middle-mile fiber and the Internet backbone, and ample access to underutilized spectrum, there may be an insufficient rate of return to induce commercial providers to deploy high-speed broadband. In the past, the U.S. has focused on providing a fair-rate return to a monopoly provider or subsidizing build-out and operational costs through programs such as the Universal Service Fund.

    Native Public Media and the National Congress of American Indians
    The disadvantaged situation of many Native Nations results in poor access to, and virtually no ownership of, communications media, telecommunications companies, and broadband providers. Only sixty-eight percent of households on Tribal lands have a telephone compared to a national average above ninety-eight percent. With only eight Tribes owning and operating their own telecommunications companies, broadband penetration on Indian lands is estimated at less than ten percent. The need for enhanced access to broadband services by Native Americans cannot be overstated. Meaningful inclusion in a national broadband plan that recognizes the unique challenges, opportunities, and responsibilities of the federal government to those in Tribal communities is a tremendous first step towards ensuring that every Native American community and family is provided affordable and reliable access to necessary broadband services.

    Sesame Workshop
    As the FCC considers the development of a national broadband plan, one of the Commission's top priorities must be ensuring the availability of services for minority and low-income families.

    One Economy Corporation
    In developing the National Broadband Plan (National Plan), the FCC should create "Broadband with a Purpose and a Social Dividend," a national plan that harnesses market forces to advance an important public purpose and serve other national priorities. Spectrum and Universal Service Fund subsidies are both valuable public resources, and the Commission has a responsibility to align these resources in a way that stimulates economic development, improves health outcomes and advances educational opportunities. Developing a National Plan geared to these public purposes should yield an important social dividend, benefiting underserved and unserved sectors. In the case of broadband, this social dividend must focus on bridging the digital divide for low‐income individuals and those left out of the first wave of broadband Internet expansion and adoption.

    New Jersey Division Of Rate Counsel

    • Expand universal service support to include broadband services
    • AfJordability for all citizens
    • Access by the disabled and elderly community
    • Consumers should benefit from the ubiquitous copper networks they have funded:
    • Rippling digital divide

    Media and Democracy Coalition

    1. Broadband communications is a fundamental right.
    2. Good policy must be well informed.
    3. Policy should promote competition, innovation, localism, and opportunity.
    4. Government should use public resources and assets wisely.
    5. Federal policy should stress digital inclusion and the service of traditionally disenfranchised communities.

    Consumer Federation and Consumers Union
    While competition has failed as a means of promoting universal service, the Commission
    has failed to adjust its universal service funding to address universal broadband service:

    • failed to use the high cost fund to target broadband deployment,
    • failed to use the lifeline and link-up programs to promote broadband connectivity, and
    • failed to properly regulate middle mile charges, which increased the price of broadband.

    The FCC must change course, if it is to advance the nation toward universal broadband service.

    The Nebraska Rural Independent Companies
    Because market forces alone are inadequate to achieve the goal of all Americans having access to broadband capability, the Nebraska Rural Independent Companies (Nebraska Companies) urge the Commission to revise its 2005 Policy Statement to account for market failures in high cost areas, to transition its universal service programs from support for voice service to support for broadband access to the public Internet, and to base such support programs on realistic cost and revenue models.

    Rural Internet And Broadband Policy Group (includes Benton Foundation)
    We base these comments and recommendations on four principles that we believe should guide the development of the future of broadband in rural communities:
    1. Communication is a fundamental human right.
    2. Rural America is diverse.
    3. Local ownership and investment in community is the priority.
    4. Network neutrality and open access are vital.

    Rural Cellular Association
    A central part of the Commission's strategy should be the revamping of existing Universal Service Fund support mechanisms so that they are directly targeted to fund broadband deployment. Utilizing restructured USF mechanisms offers an efficient and stable means of funding the construction of broadband infrastructure. The national broadband plan should call for a USF restructuring focused on the following general objectives:

    • Respond to consumers' preferences for mobile services and broadband services.
    • Ensure the affordability of broadband services for all consumers, by meeting the service and rate comparability principles of the Telecommunications Act of 1996.
    • Account for, and take full advantage of, the important role that wireless technologies can play in expanding the country's broadband capabilities, especially in rural and high-cost areas.

    National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative and DigitalBridge Communications
    NRTC and DBC have a plan to bring robust, affordable, reliable, sustainable, scalable and upgradeable wireless broadband services to some of the neediest communities across our nation, but the support of our government is needed to make it happen. First, the impediments to bringing broadband to rural, remote and disadvantaged populations are predominantly financial. The financial support of our government, as found in existing loan and grant programs, stimulus dollars, and universal service support mechanisms, forms a good start, but more funding, and the right funding, likely will be needed to ensure sustainable universal broadband access.

    Second, in answer to the Commission's question about which technologies might work best for specific kinds of deployments, the Commission should note from the numerous comments filed
    with respect to Rural Broadband Strategy, that wireless broadband is one of the quickest, most cost efficient, most future-proofed solutions for bringing quality broadband to rural areas. Critical support from our government is needed to encourage and enable wireless broadband deployments, including policies and mechanisms that support making spectrum, middle-mile access, infrastructure, and consumer equipment available.

    Rural Telecommunications Congress
    This problem is exemplified by the phase "access to broadband." The goal is not access to broadband, but access through broadband, a fine but critical distinction: Access through broadband to consumer information, civic activities, safety and security resources, community development, healthcare, means of reducing energy consumption, education and training, entrepreneurial and investment opportunities, employment and economic growth. Such access through broadband requires computers and other hardware, support and training, and software infrastructure, e.g., websites, information, and applications that actually achieve the policy goals, as well as broadband services, to be available and affordable. There are three important implications of this:

    1. Broadband is only one component of our nation's system of information infrastructure, and is a component that constrains but does not determine the value of that infrastructure,
    2. The value of information infrastructure is determined in use by citizens ("consumers")—corporate and individual—as they provide and use services related to the policy goals, and
    3. Applications and related software infrastructure are possibly the most essential component of our information infrastructure, determine the extent to which the policy goals can be met, and should be the basis for setting performance specifications for broadband.


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