Industry praises FCC’s plan for broadband
The National Broadband Plan is full of great ideas. Now comes the hard part: execution.
By Tam Harbert, Contributing Editor -- EDN, April 13, 2010
The National Broadband Plan published last month by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission contained good news for companies that make communications chips, networking equipment, and consumer electronics. After all, its goal of making high-speed broadband ubiquitous in this country would create huge demand for such products.
“The FCC has done a commendable job in developing this plan,” says Marjorie Dickman, Intel’s senior attorney for communications policy. “Now it comes down to execution. We look forward to working with the FCC to advance those issues that we most strongly supported.” Those include making more spectrum available for next-generation mobile broadband, increasing the broadband adoption rate of low-income and other vulnerable populations, and changing the universal service fund (USF) to support broadband, she notes.
Don’t hold your breath on the execution part, however.
“This is clearly a long-term process,” says Gary Arlen, president of the telecom consulting firm Arlen Communications Inc. The over-arching goal of the broadband plan is to provide 100 megabit/second service to 100 million U.S. households within ten years. But the report’s well-written 376 pages cover a broad range of issues, from the availability of spectrum to digital inclusiveness, many of which are not under FCC authority. “There are a lot of great ideas that are consolidated in the plan,” he adds. “I like the report’s comprehensive, omnibus approach.”
And the fact that a federal court ruled against the FCC last week, calling into question the agency’s authority to regulate broadband, didn’t seem to faze Chairman Julius Genachowski. The agency has charged forward, announcing on April 8 a schedule of more than 60 rulemaking initiatives from the plan that it wants to undertake this year.
The most obvious impact on the electronics industry would be chip sales related to providing 100 megabits/second to 100 million homes. “That means someone’s going to have to make a lot of transceivers,” not only for connections in the home but also for circuits in the network itself, says Gerry Kaufhold, principal analyst at In-Stat.
Here are other areas most likely to impact semiconductor suppliers and OEMs:
Free up more spectrum
The FCC wants to make an additional 500 MHz available for broadband use within the next 10 years, 300 MHz of it by 2015. “If the U.S. does not address this [spectrum shortage] promptly, scarcity of mobile broadband could mean higher prices, poor service quality, an inability for the US to compete internationally, depressed demand, and ultimately, a drag on innovation,” says the report. It proposes a variety of ways to do that, including reallocating some of the TV broadcaster’s airwaves and expanding opportunities “for innovative spectrum access models,” such as the use of white spaces in the TV broadcasting bands. In fact, the report called quick completion of the final rules for TV white-space devices in order to accelerate the introduction
of new innovative products and services. The report also proposes that the FCC free up a new contiguous nationwide band for unlicensed use.
Encourage new devices, particularly in set top boxes
The report emphasizes a lack of competition in one particular category of devices that connect to the network: the set-top box, where Cisco and Motorola hold 92 percent of the market. STBs are “an important part of the broadband ecosystem” as video drives more broadband usage, it says. “The lack of innovation in set-top boxes limits what consumers can do and their choices to consume video, and [the lack of innovation limits] the emergence of new uses and applications. It may also be inhibiting business models that could serve as a powerful driver of adoption and utilization of broadband, such as models that integrate traditional television and the Internet.” To encourage more competition, the plan would extend CableCard requirements to all multichannel video programming distributors, requiring them to install a gateway device by Dec. 31, 2012. The FCC thinks this “would allow consumer electronic manufacturers to design to a stable, common open interface and to integrate multiple functions within a retail device,” says the plan. “It could enable the emergence of completely new classes of devices, services and applications involving video and broadband.”
Change the universal service fund
Designed primarily to support telephone services in rural and underserved areas, the USF is projected to spend $8.7 billion this year. The FCC proposes to shift this program from supporting legacy telephone networks to supporting high-capacity broadband networks. It proposes creating a “Connect America Fund” immediately, including a fast-track program to fund new broadband installation in unserved areas. It also would create
a “Mobility Fund” to support deployment of 3G networks in order to bring all states to a minimum level of 3G availability.
Give consumers access to the smart grid
The report recommends that states require electric utilities to provide consumers access to information on their energy use, including real-time information from smart meters and historical consumption, price and bill data over the Internet. If states fail to develop reasonable policies over the next 18 months, the FCC wants Congress to consider passing legislation to require it.
Try, again, for an interoperable public safety network
Ever since 9/11, efforts to create a system that could allow public-safety officials from various jurisdictions to communicate with each other have failed. The plan takes another stab at this, proposing that a broadband-based public-safety network be in place by 2020.
Although the report is chock full of good ideas, and despite Genachowski’s enthusiasm to launch into action, few expect any immediate impacts. First, only about half of the recommendations lie within the FCC’s authority, says Arlen. And there is significant political opposition to some parts of the plan, particularly from broadcasters. Expectations are even lower for the parts of the plan that require Congressional action. Unless there is some sort of crisis – for example, another terrorist attack that again highlights the lack of an interoperable public safety communications network, “Congress has no incentive to do this,” says Arlen.
Resources:
The FCC’s National Broadband Plan
The FCC’s broadband action agenda
