FCC Adopts the First Consolidated Communications Marketplace Report

The Federal Communications Commission adopted its first Communications Marketplace Report, which provides a comprehensive evaluation of the state of the communications marketplace. As required by Title IV of RAY BAUM’S Act of 2018, the report consolidates several separate reports to address the state of the broader communications marketplace in one place. And as mandated by Congress, this report will be issued every two years. In total, 10 separate regularly recurring FCC reports were eliminated or materially modified, and relevant data has now been consolidated into a single, comprehensive report. The report provides: 

• Increased transparency. By consolidating numerous Commission reports, which had been issued separately and posted separately, data is now easier to find, review, and use.
• A holistic overview of competition across all communications marketplaces: mobile wireless, fixed broadband, audio, video, and satellite communications markets.
• An assessment of the state of deployment of communications capabilities.
• An assessment of barriers to competitive entry, including market entry barriers for entrepreneurs and other small businesses.
• A compilation of geographic areas that are not served by any provider of advanced telecommunications capabilities.
• A description of the Commission’s actions to address challenges and opportunities in the communications marketplace during the previous two years.
• A discussion of the Commission’s agenda for continuing to address those challenges and opportunities over the next two years.