CCG Consulting

Starlink recently announced plans for some interesting billing options. First, they will consider allowing customers to resell bandwidth to their neighbors by setting up small local grids. They are also considering allowing for billing by the hour, day, or week. What’s interesting about this is if this introduced in the U.S., it would allow for broadband billing in ways that already happen in many other parts of the world.

I was recently reading some older regulations related to copper, and this reminded me how regulation was used for many years to shape competition, or to be more precise, regulation was used to protect monopoly providers from competition.

Maybe for the first time ever, we’re seeing some real price competition affecting the largest internet service providers. Fierce Network recently quoted Comcast CFO Jason Armstrong as saying that he is seeing irrationally low prices from some fiber overbuilders who are selling gigabit broadband for as little as $30–$40 per month.

To the surprise of nobody who has been following the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program train wreck, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration pulled a fast one with the non-deployment funds. Rather than giving guidance on the $21 billion of non-deployment funds, NTIA has instead determined that some tiny portion of the non-deployment funds can now be used to build more infrastructure. That sounds really good on paper, because who’s not in favor of building more infrastructure?

In 2025, Edgebeam Wireless was formed to take advantage of the unused spectrum of TV stations. The business is a partnership between the E.W. Scripps Company, Gray Media, Nexstar Media Group, and Sinclair. You may recall that a few years ago the FCC held an incentive auction to lure TV stations to sell their spectrum, and many station owners decided to do so. However, many TV stations, including these companies retained the spectrum because they perceived that the value in using the spectrum was greater than the value of selling it.

Throughout this year, I’ve been hearing the phrase “good enough broadband” to describe consumers willing to take slower, less robust broadband connections in order to save money. This is most commonly used when referring to fixed wireless access broadband, but I’ve seen big internet service provider executives using the phrase when talking about customers who leave fiber for any slower technology. This is not a new phenomenon.

Researchers from Pennsylvania State University recently published an excellent report, Beyond Connectivity Among Rural First Responders in Pennsylvania. The report is based on the findings from focus groups and interviews with law enforcement officers, firefighters, EMTs, 911 center representatives, local officials, and other key stakeholders. The in-depth discussions identified multiple problems that hinder public safety work in rural areas:

There are at least two federal agencies that have been awarding smaller grants that are broadband-related. The Delta Regional Authority (DRA) makes grants aimed at economic development in 255 counties and parishes in parts of Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, and Tennessee. A similar agency is the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC), which plays a similar role across 423 counties in Appalachia across thirteen states. These agencies are required by law to make most of their awards in economically distressed counties.

A look at why ISPs fail or get into early trouble and struggle, including the common mistakes I’ve seen that have led to big problems for ISPs. 

SpaceX has now told the Federal Communications Commission multiple times that the agency should begin the process of phasing down and eliminating all rural high-cost subsidies from the Universal Service Fund. The company filed comments asking for the end of subsidies in FCC Docket 26-96, which is looking at reforming the High-cost fund for an all IP Future, and in Docket 10-90 that was looking at Universal Service Fund reform. In both filings, SpaceX says that its proliferation of low-orbit satellites means that rural subsidies are obsolete and are no longer needed.