Internet/Broadband

Infrastructure Bill Offers Telecommunications Unions a $43 Billion Boon

The part of the bipartisan infrastructure bill dedicated to distributing $42.5 billion in broadband funds would give preference to companies with a record of following labor and employment laws—a requirement that, practically speaking, could give an advantage to professionalized union workforces over the constellation of subcontractors that power the telecommunications industry.

New UK broadband rules will make it easier to switch supplier

Ofcom, the media and telecommunications regulator for the United Kingdom, has introduced a new service to make it easier for customers to switch broadband supplier to get a better deal. Ofcom hopes that the new process, One Touch Switch, will encourage people to seek out better deals after research found that more than two-fifths of people were put off switching broadband suppliers because of the hassle.

Wind Talker creates mesh wireless networks to extend existing broadband infrastructure

Wind Talker Innovations is a five-year-old startup whose software creates a mesh network out of wireless devices such as smartphones and tablets. Company executives say they don’t want to compete with wireless carriers, but rather they want to extend existing networks and make them more efficient. “The focus point for us is to partner with telcos and ISPs because they do have this infrastructure in place” such as macro towers, small cells and fiber backhaul, says CEO and Co-founder of Wind Talker Matt Perdew.

Strategies for State Leaders Working to Bridge the Digital Divide for Students

In spring 2020, the US Department of Education's Office of Educational Technology hosted a series of listening sessions with state leaders—from state educational agencies, state broadband offices, state libraries, and state economic development agencies—to identify what digital equity issues were magnified as a result of school closings, what immediate actions states were taking to address these issues, and what long-term solutions were being considered to sustainably address these issues.

DigitalC helps Cleveland try to bridge its digital divide

Non-profit wireless internet service provider DigitalC is using Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) and leveraging federal funds and private donations to subsidize broadband service and infrastructure deployment to last-mile homes in Cleveland (OH).

Will lawmakers really pass $65B for broadband?

At stake is a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill that would devote $65 billion to broadband efforts and a Democrats-only $3.5 trillion social spending package with its own billions for broadband, privacy and other tech and telecommunications priorities. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) told her Democratic colleagues that the House would begin floor debate on the bipartisan infrastructure bill on September 27 and hold a vote on September 30, following 

Willingness to pay and pricing for broadband across the rural/urban divide in Canada

Efforts to close the rural/urban digital divide in Canada have reached new heights in the wake of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and “stay-at-home” policies. Yet the extent to which the rural/urban digital divide extends to pricing and demand for broadband services is not well understood. Using a dataset of more than 4700 residential survey responses from southern Ontario, Canada, we assess the disparity in pricing and willingness to pay for broadband across rural and urban households.

FCC Commits Over $1.2 Billion in First Emergency Connectivity Funding Wave

The Federal Communications Commission is committing $1,203,107,496.88 for 3,040 schools, 260 libraries, and 24 consortia that applied for support from the $7.17 billion Emergency Connectivity Fund Program. This first wave of funding commitments will provide students, school staff and library patrons in all 50 states and Guam, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia access to the devices and broadband connectivity they need to support their off-campus education needs.

Rural Counties with More Broadband Tended to Do Better in 2020 Census, Study Shows

Although most of the nation’s rural counties lost population from 2010 to 2020, new Census data shows that rural counties with better broadband access tended to do better with population change than counties that lacked access. As more residents had access to broadband as defined by the Federal Communications Commission in 2011, the county population increased nine years later. Most counties did improve their broadband situation as the 2010s continued. Broadband access grew as the decade progressed for both kinds of counties – those that lost population and those that gained.  But the impor

Broadband Subscribers

The largest cable and wireline phone providers in the US – representing about 96% of the market – have added about 15,400,000 subscribers over the past five years (compared to about 14,600,000 net adds over the prior five years). Top broadband providers added 8,000,000 subscribers over the past two years, including about 4,330,000 net adds over the past year, and about 3,670,000 net adds over the prior year. Net broadband additions in the second quarter of 2021, 890,000, were the most in any second quarter in the past decade, except for 2Q 2020.

Need and Importance of Reliable Internet Has Never Been So Critical as Speed and Consistency Drive Customer Satisfaction, J.D. Power Finds

As so many residential internet customers have needed to rely more heavily on their internet service provider to stay connected for work, school and entertainment, two-thirds (66%) of customer satisfaction is driven by the quality and speed of their internet connection and how the customer perceives the value of that connection, according to the JD Power 2021 US Residential Internet Service Provider Satisfaction Study. Verizon ranks highest in the East region with a score of 758 (on a 1,000-point scale), followed by Xfinity (725).

In the Race for 5G, Alarm and Security Services Get Stuck in the Middle

In early 2019, AT&T announced it would phase out 3G wireless service in February 2022, meaning that devices designed to communicate using 3G technology would no longer have a connection after that date. Security systems companies were replacing the older gear when the pandemic lockdown began in March 2020. By early 2021, Covid-19 concerns had eased and people were more willing to let her workers into their homes.

Searchlight Capital Bets on Universal Broadband

Ajit Pai led the Federal Communications Commission as chairman during the Trump administration, after earlier serving as a commissioner during the Obama administration and as a member of the agency’s staff. Trained as a lawyer, in April 2021 he became a partner with Searchlight Capital Partners, where he helps guide the private-equity firm’s digital infrastructure investments. According to Mr. Pai, private capital can play a vital role in providing broadband internet access to the many areas of the US that still have slow service or none at all.

Treasury’s $10 Billion Capital Projects Fund Will Advance Digital Equity

The US Department of the Treasury released its long-awaited guidance for how states, territories, freely associated states, and Tribal governments can spend the $10 billion allocated in Section 604 of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) for Capital Projects.

Benton and TPRC Celebrate 5 years of Charles Benton Early Career Scholar Awards

This year, the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society celebrates our 40th year of protecting democratic values and championing a communications system that works for everyone. Our values of access, equity, and diversity remain the same. But we’ve advanced our mission with the times. We began as an institution focused on the public interest issues raised by emerging communications technologies and on championing long-term public policy solutions to address these issues.

Treasury Ready to Send Billions to States for Broadband Projects

This week, the Department of the Treasury released guidance for the Coronavirus Capital Projects Fund program established by the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.

USC, CETF and Pew Collaborate on Groundbreaking Research to Expand Affordable Broadband

In the first-of-its-kind collaboration, nationally-recognized researchers from the University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, in partnership with the California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF) and with support from The Pew Charitable Trusts, will identify effective and sustainable strategies for bringing affordable Internet to all Americans.

California Emerging Technology Fund Calls for More Outreach for Broadband Subsidies

The California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF) calls on Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and public agencies to begin advertising and increase awareness programs to reach the nation’s neediest residents.  According to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), only 1 in 12 eligible households, or 5.7 million households nationally, have enrolled in the Emergency Broadband Benefit (EBB) as of September 19.  In a separate analysis by CETF, based on FCC enrollment data, 35 percent of 2 million eligible California households have enrolled for a total of nearly 706,000 households.  The analysi

T-Mobile gains cred in smaller markets as ‘the 5G company’

T-Mobile President and CEO Mike Sievert said his company is focused on rural areas not because that’s where it promised to build out 5G, but because “it’s the size of the prize.” Big wireless carriers tend to be pretty low-key in smaller and more rural areas because the economics don’t pencil out – they represent large geographic areas to cover and fewer people to pay for service.

Facebook partners with Appalachian Power and GigaBeam Networks to provide internet in Virginia

Facebook is partnering with Appalachian Power, a utility that serves the southeastern region of the US, and Virginia-based internet service provider GigaBeam Networks to bring fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) and wireless internet service to approximately 6,000 unserved households in Grayson County (VA). In Virginia, Facebook is building new long-haul fiber routes that will connect its Virginia, Ohio, and North Carolina data centers.

T-Mobile talks up its rural broadband ambitions

T-Mobile unveiled plans to expand into rural markets with 5G for mobile and home internet service. The company no longer comes from the position of being a scrappy upstart, or the fourth-largest national carrier. It’s now the second-largest operator in the US, and is leveraging its acquisition of Sprint to set its sights on smaller and rural markets as part of its expansion.

Community-Based Internet Providers Deliver World-Class Innovation to the Unserved

For the past two decades, community-based providers – that is, thousands of upstart internet service providers – have crisscrossed America, delivering internet access services with adeptness and skill. Using a potent combination of wireless spectrum and fiber, they deliver fixed connectivity to distant rural and hard to serve urban environments. In short, they’re small innovators and entrepreneurs offering needed choice for communities that have been effectively abandoned by legacy phone and cable providers.

Cable Broadband Providers Deploy Fast Internet to All Communities Regardless of Income or Race

NCTA - The Internet & Television Association examined data pulled from FCC and Census Bureau reports to determine where cable's broadband networks have been deployed in urban centers. The findings from this report, "Building a Gigabit Nation: An Analysis of Cable's Superfast Networks in Urban Communities," indicate that cable broadband providers have long been committed to and are continually expanding, deploying, and upgrading their networks in all communities, regardless of income or race.

North Carolina prepares for a $1 billion broadband push

Despite nearly 70,000 North Carolina households and businesses conducting internet connection speed tests as part of a year-long survey, the state “still has a lot more to do” before it can begin a $1 billion broadband expansion, according to state officials. The survey, launched in July 2020 by North Carolina State University’s Friday Institute, found that at least 450,000 households, or roughly 10 percent of the state, lacks adequate broadband coverage.