Fiber Broadband Association

One out of four urban households do not have a wireline subscription or the infrastructure to support one, making the challenge of closing the digital divide no small matter. Achieving digital equity is going to take time, and efforts will be ongoing as technology evolves and household circumstances change. “Digital skills are one issue that will never go away,” said Angela Siefer, Executive Director, National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA).

The Fiber Broadband Association (FBA) announced a suite of Broadbandtoolkit.com geospatial planning tools for FBA members to visualize existing broadband deployments and areas of opportunity.

The Fiber Broadband Association (FBA) and RVA LLC Market Research & Consulting (RVA) released an annual consumer research report titled, “The Status of U.S. Broadband: The Growing Preference to Fiber Broadband.” The 2023 study reveals fiber broadband is considered the best internet service delivery method in terms of speed and reliability among 63% of all US consumers, including 54% of cable users.

The Fiber Broadband Association (FBA) and Cartesian unveiled their Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Threshold Financial Model that helps states calculate their Extremely High Cost Per Location Threshold (EHCT) for fiber broadband deployments using BEAD funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA).

One of the most critical questions that each State and Territory must tackle in implementing the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program is how to make efficient investments in the most reliable, capable, and sustainable broadband connectivity for those residents and businesses that have been left behind while reaching as many unserved and underserved locations as possible.

As state and local officials gear up to build fiber networks through Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) and other programs, opportunities abound for leveraging various funding to demonstrate how to get the most economic and societal benefits out of their networks, according to US Ignite Co-founder and CEONick Maynard. “Our mission is to help support underserved communities by helping them with their main challenges, but also through economic development or startup and research commercialization challenges,” said Maynard. Going into its second decade of operation, US Ignite curr

Providing internet to every household and small business by 2030 may not take a village, but it will require the efforts of local officials and service providers working together to pave the way for fast and efficient construction, an effort that the National Association of Counties (NACo) says its members have been steadily working on. “About two years ago, we put together NACo’s Broadband Task Force,” said Seamus Dowdall, NACo's Associate Legislative Director for Telecommunications & Technology. The task force generated a report to define how counties could facilitate the deployment o

As the production of fiber continues to increase, so do improvements to its physical properties. Service providers are buying more quantities of bendable fiber and looking towards the next generation of 200-micron fiber which will provide increased density and likely reduce material usage. “If you break it down, you’ll see that [North America] fiber demand has tripled since 2015,” said Greg Williams, Business Unit Director, Fiber Cable Systems, Prysmian Group. “And it’s doubled since 2018.

As broadband needs continue to increase, service providers want to build a “No Regrets” fiber network capable of operating for decades and easily upgradable as user needs increase and technology evolves.

There are a variety of landline or wireless technologies that can deliver broadband. In most instances, wireless solutions have an advantage with respect to mobility and transferability (the ability to move broadband investment from one subscriber location to another). However, this advantage often disappears (and sometimes flips) when considering the increased operational expenses of wireless and the ongoing capital investment required.