Freeband TV News

U.S regulator says universal broadband deployment must be sped up

Written by Chris Andrews

UK Culture Secretary pushes back own promises by three years

Over the past week there have been government rumblings on both sides of the Atlantic concerning broadband deployments, particularly to un-served or under-served areas. While the U.S. is pushing hard to speed up adoption, the UK has realised its 2012 promises are unattainable, moving its deadline for universal coverage to 2015.

First in the US, the FCC has published its latest Broadband Deployment Report, finding that 14 to 24 million Americans lack access to broadband, which the report redefines as at least 4Mbps, up from 200 kbps, and that the immediate prospects for deployment to them “are bleak”.

The report said that in an era when broadband has become essential for U.S. jobs, economic growth, global competitiveness, and democratic engagement, millions of Americans live in areas without broadband. “Many of these Americans are poor or live in rural areas that will remain unserved without reform of the universal service program and other changes to U.S. broadband policy that spur investment in broadband networks by lowering the cost of deployment.”

“The report we release today uses new data and improved analysis to take an honest look at the current state of broadband in America,” said FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. “On Congress’s question of universality — whether all Americans are on track to being served — the best available data shows that between 14 and 24 million Americans live in areas where they cannot get broadband.”

The report concludes that the goal of universal availability is not being met in a timely way, and proposes to address key recommendations from the FCC’s National Broadband Plan to connect all Americans as quickly as possible.

This includes reforming the FCC’s universal service programs to support public-private partnerships, reducing barriers to infrastructure investment, and releasing spectrum for mobile broadband. It also calls for better collection of broadband data to assist policymakers and consumers.

Upon publication of the report, Telcos expressed a sense of confusion at its findings.

Kathleen Grillo, Senior Vice President for Federal Regulatory Affairs at Verizon, said it made no sense that as the National Broadband Plan concluded that 95 per cent of Americans had access to wireline broadband, the FCC majority were now suggesting that broadband deployment was not reasonable and timely. “The report's conclusion is hard to understand, given America's extraordinary progress in deploying broadband, fueled by hundreds of billions of dollars in private investment,” she said.

"Of course, we still have work to do to ensure that broadband reaches the remaining 5 per cent of American households. Verizon has and will continue to support comprehensive reform of the universal service program and other policies to help achieve that important goal. But we hope that the FCC's finding is not used as a justification to roll back the bipartisan, pro-investment policies that have brought broadband to 290 million Americans."

AT&T’s Senior Vice President - Federal Regulatory, Robert Quinn, writing on AT&T public policy blog said that the FCC’s conclusion that broadband was not being reasonably deployed, based on 7 million homes in rural America that would require $23.5 billion in federal subsidies to connect to wireline broadband, was an “unreasonable conclusion”.

“As a part of its National Broadband Plan, the FCC identified 7 million homes without access to wireline broadband service capable of 4 Mbps. Some of those areas have broadband at lower speeds; all have access to satellite-based broadband. The agency concluded “it is unlikely that private capital will fund infrastructure capable of delivering broadband that meets the [4 Mbps] target” because of the exorbitant cost of reaching those homes.”

Meanwhile in the UK, the Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt is still going on about the UK having the best superfast broadband in Europe, now by 2015. Strangely, he is talking about the universal 2Mbps broadband which came out of the Digital Britain report. This is not super fast, and even how this paltry target will be achieved remains ambiguous.

Mr Hunt is certainly a fan of letting the private sector get on with things, praising Virgin Media’s announcement that they will start to roll out a 100Mbps service by the end of the year, and BT’s announcement of an extra £1 billion investment in infrastructure upgrades. There was also the appointment of Martha Lane Fox as ‘UK Digital Champion’ – with the task of closing the digital divide and getting the whole of the country online. Good luck.

And then Mr Hunt said, “Let me now be clear about the role the government will play.” One might then expect Mr Hunt to be clear about the role government will play, but one would be disappointed, as apparently that role is to allow private industry to get on with things. Oh yes, and establishing a series of Rural Market Testing Projects, which will hopefully produce yet another report, the conclusions of which will not be acted on.

“Our aim is to use these to discover exactly what needs to be done to make superfast broadband commercially viable in rural communities as well as urban areas, and to understand what kind of government support will be necessary.”

Great. There is no mention of funding, though a report published coinciding with Mr Hunt’s speech said government would consider using part of the BBC licence fee to fund rural rollouts, but this is at best vague.

He also called on industry to tell Government what would be needed to make things easier “And we will be happy to consider the action that you want. Based on your feedback, we will come back in September with a clear plan for the legislative change that we need, and a clear timetable for making it happen.” Right, OK.

The Communications Union (CWU) described Mr Hunt’s announcements as a “cop-out”, as without clear public funding arrangements his aspirations will remain “pie-in-the-sky” for millions of UK citizens and hundreds of thousands of businesses.

CWU deputy general secretary Andy Kerr said, "The announcements made by the Government today are effectively calls for further inaction... Both the Tories and Liberal Democrats have supported the main objectives of [the Digital Britain report] but have resolutely opposed the means by which they could be delivered - namely the introduction of the levy as recommended in the Finance Bill they opposed."

CWU Assistant Secretary Brian Healy added, "This initiative would appear to be trying to give the appearance of action. In reality it will not close the digital divide, which the government clearly accepts as being there, even though they also agree that the markets alone will not deliver."

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