Biden’s Infrastructure Participants, Low-Price Broadband Access, U.S. Versus EU On Broadband

April 22, 2021 – The Rural Broadband Association (NTCA) and the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA) want to ensure all community-based providers have a seat at Biden’s infrastructure funding table.

In an Thursday op-ed for the Morning Consult, WISPA CEO Claude Aiken and NTCA CEO Shirley Bloomfield said they don’t want Biden’s new infrastructure proposal—the American Jobs Plan—to exclude some members of their organizations simply because they don’t fit the criteria of “broadband networks owned, operated by, or affiliated with local governments, non-profits, and co-operatives.”

“Corporate structure does not dictate the strength of commitment to closing the digital divide,” Aiken and Bloomfield wrote. “We also count among our memberships family-owned companies, sole proprietorships, Tribal internet service providers and other community-based commercial businesses who are today delivering essential services across rural and small-town America.”

Many of the providers in WISPA and NTCA who would be excluded from the infrastructure funding are committed to their communities on delivering broadband service, they wrote. “They have helped to keep us connected, productive and safe during these difficult times. It is hard to fathom what the crisis might have become without them,” they wrote.

“We believe any community-based provider with a proven track record of performance should be eligible for funding regardless of corporate form,” they wrote. “Corporate structure should not matter if your heart and soul has been devoted to bringing essential connectivity to the hardest to reach and serve in America.”

Low-priced broadband access higher, BroadbandNow report says

Access to low-priced broadband has seen a significant increase over the last year, according to BroadbandNow’s first quarter 2021 report on the “State of Broadband in America,” released Wednesday.

“For the first time, more than 3 of 4 of Americans (77 percent) have access to low-priced wired broadband plans compared to 50 percent in our 2020 Q1 report,” the report said.

“The expansion of cost-effective broadband internet to more than three-quarters of the U.S. population is a milestone, yet one we must continue to push further,” said Tyler Cooper, editor-in-chief of BroadbandNow. “Momentum toward closing the digital divide is at an all-time high, and it is clearer than ever that both access and affordability must be addressed.”

Low-priced internet is a plan that costs $60 per month or less, excluding promotional pricing, with a minimum speed of 25 megabits per second (Mbps) download and 3 Mbps upload. That speed threshold matches the Federal Communications Commission’s definition of high-speed broadband.

Other key findings in the report include data that only 31 percent of Americans have access to a low-priced plan that has 100 Mbps download/25 Mbps upload speed, a significant speed increase over the 25/3 Mbps threshold. It also details that 41 percent of Americans have access to symmetrical service of 100 Mbps speed from a wired or fixed wireless provider.

Data for the report comes from “(a) pricing and package data from all 2,000+ U.S. ISPs, (b) publicly available FCC “Form 477” data, (of which the latest public release was December 2020) and (c) updated coverage data voluntarily submitted to us directly from providers,” according to the report.

US Telecom says U.S. leads EU on broadband

In another report released Wednesday, US Telecom says the United States significantly leads the European Union in broadband deployment and adoption.

“The study: US vs. EU Broadband Trends (2012-2019) debunks a persistent myth that the EU’s more intensive framework for broadband regulation has yielded a superior online experience for consumers and ought to be replicated in the United States,” read the US Telecom statement.

According to the report, the U.S. leads the EU by 12 percentage points on deployment for speeds at 30 Mbps, and leads by 25 percent points at speeds higher than 100 Mbps. For adoption, the U.S. leads by 9 percentage points at 30 Mbps and by 21 percentage points at speeds higher than 100 Mbps, the report said. In rural areas the U.S. leads by 20 percentage points at 30 Mbps.

The report also details investment costs by broadband providers, saying that the U.S. invests three times more than the EU per household, or approximately $700 per home per year. And American consumers “enjoy twice the facilities-based competition as their EU counterparts.”

“It’s no contest. If the U.S. had followed the EU’s more regulatory broadband path, our digital divide would be substantially bigger and our shared networks considerably less prepared for the traffic demands of the pandemic and our increasingly connected economy,” US Telecom CEO Jonathan Spalter said in a statement.