The vote leaves intact the full $7.2 billion in broadband grants and loans funding authorized by the ARRA. The House’s action sends the bill to the White House for the president’s signature.
This shows a continuing commitment to rural broadband, and given the other legislation moving through committee shows that the voice of rural America is being heard. Keep it up! Keep talking to your congressmen and congresswomen.
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( 0 / 0 )As some of you may have noticed, posting has been pretty thin on this site in the last few months, most especially the last few weeks. Happily, it's all been with a plan.
As of today, I'm pleased to announce that we're moving this blog to a new (easier-to-find) location on our website and giving it a new name: Industry Matters. As news/announcements regarding Stimulus-related topics have dwindled we've wanted to explore broader industry topics but didn't have the right venue. Now we do. Expect to see coverage of topics ranging from my upcoming OPASTCO trip to a new series of "telco services" posts giving real-world customer examples.
Please be sure to update your RSS feeds and/or bookmarks as all new posts will be available here: http://www.occamnetworks.com/solutions/blog/
A big thank you to all the loyal readers and customers. See you at the new site.
-Rebecca
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( 0 / 0 )We're wrapping up another successful week hosting the Occam Networks Users Group (ONUG) conference in Washington, D.C. It's been an eventful week full of collaborative discussions between our customers, our staff and partners. In addition, we've had some great debates about the future of the rural broadband industry highlighted by a keynote address by Blair Levin, chief architect of the National Broadband Plan (NBP).
And the discussion didn't end there. Blair Levin, Jill Canfield (Senior Regulatory Counsel with NTCA) and William Metts (President of Metts Engineering) explored the future of bandwidth in rural communities, the impact of the NBP on USF and other critical issues. Needless to say, there was much to talk about.
For a recap of the first day of ONUG, check out the video summary and let us know what you think. We're already looking forward to ONUG 2011 and helping our customers continue to shape the future of rural broadband.
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( 2.8 / 13 )In Australia, it appears that Telstra, the national carrier, has reached an agreement to sell their copper infrastructure to the Australian government in exchange for partnership in the National Broadband Network that Australia is building. In effect, Telstra is agreeing to structural separation - focusing on providing telecom and data services, while letting a third party manage the network.
It got me thinking, what about your company? Would you be willing to radically rethink your business if it were possible to sell all of your installed copper plant to the US Government, in exchange for funding to build a 100% fiber optic network to every subscriber? Perhaps the Government would then pay a monthly fee for network upkeep and equipment upgrades (maybe something similar to rate of return), but your key revenues would be driven by the services you offer.
Is your company brand strong enough that your subscribers would request dial tone and internet services from you? Or would they be swayed to a offer from a Verizon, AT&T or Comcast that was freed to offer similar services over the fiber plant.
Funding broadband - whether wireline or wireless is a huge topic, and one that we will discuss on both my Market Vision panel and Industry and Regulatory panel next week at the Occam Networks Users Group in Washington DC. But the idea that a "trade out" of copper for fiber might be an interesting way to fund broadband and change business models.
I hope to get your perspective at ONUG.
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( 3.1 / 12 )The focus of a lot of the discussion on the National Broadband Plan has been Telcos. And given the Plan's focus on reforms to USF, ICC and some of the other funding mechanisms for telco rural broadband, this makes sense.
But where have the Cable companies been?
With broader deployment of DOCSIS 3.0, the goal of 100Mbps to 100M households by 2020 could be easily in reach. While it is more common to think that 100M = Fiber, if we are willing to accept the shared bandwidth of DOCSIS, customers are seeing rates of 100Mbps today. And given ten years to innovate, it is likely CableLabs could kick up that bandwidth significantly over the next ten years.
What is more interesting to me however is where Cable companies stand in the move to reclassify internet service as a telecommunications service. If this change occurs, what happens to digital cable? Clearly Cable Modems should fall under this new regulation, but what about the content that is delivered? How is digital TV program different than IPTV? How would reclassification change the fees associated with content and TV services? If it is a service delivered digitally, why could a Cox subscriber today not choose instead to subscribe to Comcast service? Or vice versa?
Other than IPTV and FIOS in select markets, there is no competition in cable. Andy Kessler, in an opinion piece in last week's Wall Street Journal states that according to SmartMoney.com, less than 1% of 30,000 cable markets had more than one provider in 2000 and 2005. It is not a whole lot better today.
Kessler speculates that the threat of opening up cable networks for competition and establishing low common carrier wholesale pricing, would spur the industry's broad endorsement of building fiber to every household.
Nearly half of US consumers, and a growing number of businesses get their internet service from cable. Isn't it time everyone worked under the same regulation? So why has Cable been so quiet?
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