Between the US Treasury clarifying that American Rescue Plan (ARP) funds are eligible to be spent on middle-mile infrastructure and the Senate infrastructure bill's proposed $1 billion grant program to support the deployment of middle-mile networks, federal assistance aiming to improve middle-mile access is imminent. Investing in public middle-mile infrastructure can be essential to create competition in broken markets.
SpaceX revealed new details about plans for the next generation of satellites in its Starlink internet system. “This Gen2 System was designed to complement the first-generation constellation SpaceX is currently deploying,” SpaceX wrote in an FCC filing.
In August 2012, the Irish government published a National Broadband Plan (NBP) which set a target of a minimum 30 Mbps download speed for all households in the country. The expected overall cost of the original plan was €350 million, with the government stating that it would contribute half of this amount along with the private sector. By 2020, these ambitious targets had not been met. After a protracted and controversial procurement process, the cost of government subsidy for the NBP had escalated to between €2.2bn and €2.9bn and the plan will not be completed until at least 2026.
Governor Mike Parson (R-MO) announced plans to deploy more than $400 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds to increase broadband internet access, adoption, and assistance statewide. The plan was developed through a multi-agency effort designed to address a diverse range of broadband connectivity challenges and is expected to impact hundreds of thousands of Missouri families.
People involved in the deployment of fiber in the United States are getting pretty excited about the potential $65 billion for broadband in the bipartisan infrastructure bill. The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) will develop the program to manage and dispense the funding, with consultation from the Federal Communications Commission.
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