12 Days of Broadband

Going Into Year 3 Without FCC Spectrum Auction Authority

Hope for a single auction, but not blanket authority, materialized at the end of the year.

Jake Neenan

Dec 20, 2024 — 6 min read

The Federal Communications Commission went its first full year without the ability to auction off airwaves in 2024, and the gridlock doesn’t show signs of letting up in the near future.

Prospects for a single auction—not blanket authority—got a lot better this week, however.

The 12 Days of Broadband (click to open)

On the First Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
An extra-planetary-life-promoting tech billionaire set on electing a president.
On the Second Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me: 23 million served by the Affordable Connectivity Program.
On the Third Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
3rd year without the Federal Communications Commission having spectrum auction authority.
On the Fourth Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
$42.5 billion in Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment funds already allocated.
On the Fifth Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
5,500 active satellites currently in Low-Earth Orbit.
On the Sixth Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
More than 6 years of service at the FCC by Commissioner and Chairman-designate Brendan Carr.
On the Seventh Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
More than 70 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity annually consumed by data centers in the U.S.
On the Eighth Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
$8.1 billion dollars in annual Universal Service Funds.
On the Ninth Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
$90 billion in global telecom Merger & Acquisition deals value in 2024.
On the Tenth Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
100 broadband-related rulemakings at the FCC relying on Chevron Deference.
On the Eleventh Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
Nearly 11 years to complete the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, complete with defaulted locations.
On the Twelfth Day of Broadband, my true love sent to me:
More than a dozen policy-makers and pro-tech thinkers echoing the Andreessen-Horowitz “Little Tech” agenda.

Congress passed a defense policy bill Wednesday that included a provision fully funding the FCC’s Rip and Replace program, which reimburses smaller providers for swapping Chinese gear from blacklisted suppliers out of their networks. The extra $3 billion needed for the effort would come from the agency reauctioning licenses in the AWS-3 band—spectrum used by mobile carriers—in the only such action the bill provides for. As of this writing, President Joe Biden has yet to sign the bill into law, but he’s expected to do so.