Diana Goovaerts

A recent round of government grants revealed the startling costs associated with covering residents in the most remote parts of the US. But while $200,000 per passing might seem like an eye-popping figure, Fiber Broadband Association CEO Gary Bolton noted that the cost applies to only the most extreme deployments. And in any event, he added, the long-term economic and systemic benefits of bringing fiber to such locations outweigh the upfront costs. According to Bolton, the average cost for a Tier-1 operator to deploy fiber is between $600 to $1,500 per passing.

A US Department of Agriculture (USDA) release of the latest grant winners for the ReConnect broadband deployment program was the cost of deploying fiber in rural America. Looking at rural Alaska as an example, the Alaska Telephone Company, which won a $33 million grant, is planning to run fiber to 211 homes and five businesses at a staggering cost of nearly $204,000 per passing. In addition to the grant, the operator said it plans to invest $11 million of its own money in the project.

Orange Group CEO Christel Heydemann and Federal Communications Commissioner Brendan Carr, called on technology giants to contribute a “fair” share to broadband infrastructure costs, arguing such companies are driving a need for continued upgrades and have disproportionately benefitted from telecommunications investments to date. Regulators in the US, EU, and South Korea are weighing rule changes that would force the likes of Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Netflix to pay telecom companies for the large amounts of traffic they generate.

It’s been nearly a year since President Joe Biden named Gigi Sohn [Senior Fellow and Public Advocate at the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society] as his pick to become the fifth member of the Federal Communications Commission, but the nominee’s prospects of actually being installed are as unclear as ever. A fresh report from The Deal tipped Sohn to squeak through the Senate confirmation process during a lame duck session in the coming months. But New Street Research analyst Blair Levin warned it’s extremely difficult to predict what will happen.

US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Under Secretary Xochitl Torres Small warned changing the definition of what counts as “rural” broadband could negatively impact programs like the agency’s ReConnect initiative, resulting in a greater disparity between available funding and requests than already exists.

Outgoing Altice USA CEO Dexter Goei revealed the operator has already secured tens of millions in broadband grant awards this year, as it pursues as much as $1 billion in government funding to boost its fiber expansion plan. Goei indicated it has received around $50 million so far this year to help it reach between 40,000 and 45,000 locations.

The Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA) has been wrestling with a ruling from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) which will effectively allow billions in federal funding to go toward wireline overbuilds of areas already covered by fixed wireless access (FWA) broadband. WISPA CEO David Zumwalt said it’s been unable to get a straight answer from the NTIA about why it decided FWA services based on unlicensed spectrum don’t count as reliable broadband. Zumwalt’s questions specifically relate to the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity, Access, an

Starlink asked the Federal Communications Commission to reconsider a decision to deny it $885.5 million in rural broadband funding.

Frontier Communications and Windstream have collectively raked in more than $210 million worth of broadband grants across nine states thus far in 2022, as the operators look to boost their fiber expansion plans with government support. Frontier has won grants in seven states: California, Indiana, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

The Federal Communications Commission plans to come out with the first version of its new broadband map in mid-November.