The FCC should mull transitioning the emergency broadband benefit into permanent Lifeline subsidy increases, and state legislators should remove barriers to utilities providing broadband in unserved and underserved areas, said NARUC broadband task force draft recommendations Monday. It recommended developing a centralized database of carriers that failed to meet obligations from previous state and federal funds. Other draft recommendations covered mapping, adoption and program coordination. The task force scheduled a June 2 virtual meeting at 2 p.m. EDT for feedback. It plans final suggestions at NARUC’s July 18-21 meeting. “Our work is meant to give state utility commissioners tools to hasten broadband availability for everyone,” said task force and South Dakota Public Utilities Commission Chairman Chris Nelson. The panel virtually heard in February its subgroups’ near-final reports (see 2102050053).
A Texas social media regulation bill cleared the House State Affairs Committee 8-5 Friday. The Senate earlier passed SB-12, which would allow private lawsuits against social media companies that moderate content. It’s one of many state bills seeking to rein in social media amid the federal debate about Communications Decency Act Section 230 (see 2104190030).
Other states support California in response to ISP associations appealing a ruling denying their preliminary injunction against the net neutrality law, in a case before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (see 2103100029). “Amici have a strong interest in defending the States’ sovereign right to exercise their police powers against unwarranted assertions of federal preemption,” said Wednesday's posting (all URLs in Pacer). “A critical aspect of the States’ sovereignty is the ability to pass laws aimed at ‘guard[ing] the lives and health of their citizens.’” New York, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin, plus Washington, D.C., were on the brief in docket 21-15430. California localities agreed with the states. “Investments in broadband-based communications systems to exchange information with the public underscore their reliance on a neutral Internet,” they said. ISPs “falsely” claim that investment declined when the 2015 federal rules were in place, said Access Now, Mozilla, Public Knowledge, New America's Open Technology Institute and Free Press. Other neutrality supporters, including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Access Humboldt, Benton Institute for Broadband & Society and Reddit, also filed in support of the state: “We have seen firsthand that stripping away legal protection for net neutrality would inflict serious harm on Californians and on California nonprofits, educators and businesses.”
Zigbee Alliance rebranded as Connectivity Standards Alliance and renamed Project Connected Home over IP as Matter. Silicon Labs jumped on Tuesday's announcement, saying its wireless technologies are available for development of Matter products that support Thread, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Telemedicine will save the healthcare industry $21 billion a year globally by 2025, increasing from $11 billion in 2021, reported Juniper Research Monday. Savings will be confined to developed nations where access to required devices and internet connectivity is most prevalent along with the proliferation in telehealth services, it said. Juniper predicts that more than 80% of savings by 2025 will be attributable to North America and Europe. It estimates that 348 million telehealth visits took place in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, compared with 280 million in 2019. “The activities of third party healthcare service developers will be crucial in accelerating the deployment of emerging telemedicine services, and increasing the uptake amongst healthcare providers,” said Juniper.
ABI warned about IoT security. “Some devices are incapable of being secured,” it said Friday: Original equipment manufacturers and vendors “often choose to accept the risk, rather than remediate it during a Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA), while many others choose not to do a CBA.” ABI estimates 8.6 billion IoT global connections, rising to 23.6 billion by 2026: "This exponential growth will usher in a new era of connectivity and productivity in the years ahead" and "new threat vectors and vulnerabilities."
The announcement by UScellular, Qualcomm, Ericsson and Inseego Thursday of sustained uplink and downlink speeds over 5G millimeter wave on a commercial network is “a huge milestone in addressing the ‘last mile’ connectivity challenge,” said ABI Research analyst Khin Sandi Lynn. Only 81% of U.S. households are connected to fixed broadband access, she said. Multi-gigabit speeds over mmWave will benefit consumers and businesses, supporting the increased broadband demand since COVID-19, Lynn said: “The solution solves the limited propagation characteristic of mmWave and will accelerate deployments of fixed wireless access services in rural and underserved areas and contribute to achieving broadband for all.” Speeds were reached at 7 kilometers, the farthest U.S. 5G mmWave FWA connection, with sustained average downlinks of about 1 Gbps, sustained average uplink speeds of about 55 Mbps and instantaneous peak downlinks at more than 2 Gbps, said the companies. At 1.75 km with no line of sight, average downlink speeds reached about 730 Mbps, with sustained average uplinks of 38 Mbps on UScellular’s network in Janesville, Wisconsin. Tests were done with Ericsson’s Antenna Integrated Radio 5322 advanced antenna system, with an Inseego Wavemaker 5G outdoor CPE FW2010 powered by Qualcomm.
Over-the-top video and e-gaming software downloads sparked another quarter of "very strong" internet traffic growth, said Akamai CEO Tom Leighton on a Q1 call Tuesday. Traffic reached an all-time high of 200 Tbps March 16, 19% higher than the peak in Q1 2020, and two and a half times the traffic peak in Q1 2019, he said. Daily peaks were high in Q1, averaging 143 Tbps, exceeding 110 Tbps “pretty much around the clock,” he said. Akamai is starting to see “some early signs” of recovery in internet traffic from the hotel and travel sector, said Chief Financial Officer Ed McGowan. “It's probably still a few quarters before we start to see that business return to a growth engine for us.” Retail internet traffic remains “a mixed bag,” he said. There are some Akamai retail accounts “that are doing well, some that aren't doing well,” he said. “We’re optimistic, but still a ways to go before we declare a victory there.”
NTIA asked for comment by June 7 on “activities, priorities, and policies that advance telecommunications and information and communications technology development worldwide” as the U.S. prepares for the ITU’s World Telecommunication Development Conference, says Thursday's Federal Register. The conference is Nov. 8-19 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
There's room for growth in streaming and with the spectrum switch involving the C-band, said the head of a cable and telecom tech company. About a quarter of Harmonic’s streaming customers are “in the process of fully launching their new streaming services,” said CEO Patrick Harshman on a Q1 call Monday. Video was $70.3 million in revenue, up year over year and “indicating growth is more than just post-pandemic recovery,” he said. Harmonic is “not immune to the global supply chain constraints,” said Harshman. “We're seeing shortages of several key components and related significantly higher costs,” with some of the most significant impacts on its “shelf hardware products,” he said. The stock closed 13% lower Tuesday at $7.05. Others also are seeing chip crunches (see 2105040071). On TV broadcasting, the vendor is “seeing a general rebound" worldwide and “capturing an increasing share,” the CEO said. “We're also seeing 5G bandwidth reclamation.” Harmonic thinks the success the industry is beginning to experience with C-band “is opening the door to a broader opportunity for wholesale IP video distribution via terrestrial fiber rather than satellite networks,” he said. Harshman sees “substantial new opportunities” in C-band “beginning to materialize in the second half of the year, and we also see it as high probability for 2022,” he said. The “next wave of opportunity” will be in the U.S., though it won’t be “overnight,” he said: A “huge amount of video” throughout the world is still “moving around over satellite networks.”