Matt Daneman

The end seems nigh for affordable connectivity program (ACP) funding, with dicey odds of Congress acting before its money runs out in early 2024, speakers said Wednesday at ACA Connects' 2023 Washington summit. Small cable operator participation in the broadband equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program will depend on the rules governing it, they said.

Some National Content & Technology Cooperative cable operator members could start launching mobile service as soon as late Q2 or Q3 under an mobile virtual network operator agreement NCTC announced Tuesday with Reach Mobile, NCTC CEO Lou Borrelli said. In an interview, he and Reach CEO Harjot Saluja said the Reach offering was designed with different levels of customization available to NCTC's cable operator membership, with a handful of choices at the simplest end to more customization available at the other. All three service tiers give a white-labeled service with Reach providing back-office services and support, Saluja said. Borrelli said handsets will be available via Reach, but most subscribers coming through NCTC member companies will likely provide their own. Smaller cable operators generally don't have storefronts and likely won't "want to get into the whole retail/inventory experience," he said. They said NCTC member companies will have their own app in the Google Play and Apple's App Store where their customers can activate and manage their plans. Under the agreement, NCTC still has to select the underlying wireless network that will be offered to members. Borrelli said the co-op is still in discussions with carriers. Even minus NCTC members with their own arrangements with mobile network operators, more than 20 million customers of NCTC members would be eligible under the offering Borrelli said.

There's a lot of government interest in fortifying U.S. internet traffic routing security, but it's less clear what it can and should do, said Wilkinson Barker cybersecurity lawyer Clete Johnson Tuesday on an FCBA cybersecurity committee webinar. Noting the FCC's open proceeding on routing security that was launched in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, he said routing security doesn't line up well with traditional regulatory tools and their focus on prescriptive compliance. Johnson said the complexity of the issue doesn't necessarily match that approach.

NTIA is close to fully staffing the dozens of federal program officer (FPO) positions that will often be the face to states and broadband providers for the agency's broadband equity, access and deployment efforts, BEAD Program Director Evan Feinman told us. FPO outreach and preparation already underway is getting high marks from broadband provider stakeholders.

A growing number of satellite operators are resisting SpaceX's urging that conditions the FCC put on its second-generation constellation should be generally applicable to all constellations.

Noting the rocketing interest in satellite direct-to-handset mobile service tied to terrestrial mobile networks, the FCC will vote at its March meeting on a framework for collaboration between terrestrial and satellite service providers, Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel wrote Wednesday, announcing the March meeting agenda. That meeting also will have votes on rules requiring mobile wireless carriers to block robotext messages considered “highly likely to be illegal," and an inmate calling NPRM and order, she said. The agency will also seek comment on expanding audio description requirements “to all remaining broadcast markets” and on “whether the costs of further expansion would be reasonable,” wrote Rosenworcel.

The White House's directive that all construction materials used in federal infrastructure projects, including fiber cable, be American made shouldn't cause big delays in or cost run-ups for fiber for broadband equity, access and deployment (BEAD) projects, we were told. It's less clear whether the directive could cause challenges in obtaining the electronics -- typically made overseas -- used to light the fiber.

Satellite use of terrestrial spectrum for direct-to-device service "will be a big tension" at the 2023 World Radiocommunication Conference and a likely subject of a WRC-2027 agenda item, said EchoStar Senior Vice President-Regulatory Affairs Jennifer Manner Wednesday at a Venable panel on space regulation. Panelists said they were fully confident the FCC's reorganization to create a Space Bureau would happen, perhaps within months.

Lower orbits are going to become increasingly in demand, Viasat Chairman/CEO Mark Dankberg said Wednesday at the Smallsat Symposium. Some of that is due to the FCC's five-year post-mission disposal rule and because satellites in lower orbits will deorbit faster than in higher ones, he said. A challenge is that pretty much every altitude between 375 and 575 km has some traffic in it already, except for the band around the International Space Station, he said.

Satellite-provided emergency SOS messaging is just the starting point for satellite operators looking to provide direct-to-handset service, but it won't be the business plan for anyone, said Iridium Director-Legal and Regulatory Coral Faradjian Tuesday in a Smallsat Symposium panel. She said the real revenue, and business plans, seamless transitions between terrestrial mobile and satellite-enabled services.