Anyone with ideas how to best test whether moving more data traffic to LTE-unlicensed will interfere with Wi-Fi should speak up now, wrote wireless lawyer Mitchell Lazarus on Fletcher Heald's blog. Qualcomm's special temporary authority to test coexistence between LTE-U and Wi-Fi in Oklahoma and North Carolina (see 1601290064), rather than settle the issue, will likely "lead to fresh controversy over whether the test conditions were realistic and what the results mean," he said. The move by carriers to push more data into LTE-U "puts the FCC in a bind" because it doesn't have legal authority to stop that, he said. "But from a practical standpoint, Wi-Fi has become so important to the economy, and such a major convenience in people's lives, that to let LTE-U degrade it would be unthinkable." Lazarus provided links for contacting Qualcomm and the Wi-Fi Alliance, which is helping develop the Qualcomm test plan, and for filing comments in docket 15-105.

Comcast plans to roll out DOCSIS 3.1-powered gigabit Internet service in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Miami and Nashville later this year, it said in a news release Tuesday. Comcast installed its first DOCSIS 3.1 modems in Atlanta and Philadelphia earlier this year, it said. "Combined with all the upgrades we have already put into our advanced fiber optic-coax network, [DOCSIS 3.1] will not only provide more gigabit speed choices for customers, it will also eventually make these ultra-fast speeds available to the most homes in our service areas," Comcast Central Division President Bill Connors said in a statement. Comcast said DOCSIS 3.1 modems have been tested, but their use in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Miami and Nashville is their first wide deployment.

While a recent FCC report indicating broadband isn't being rolled out broadly enough or quickly enough to meet a statutory deployment mandate (see 1601280064) got much attention, another recent FCC report comparing U.S. broadband rollout with other parts of the world (see 1602010071) deserves more, NCTA said in a blog post Tuesday. "The FCC’s international report demonstrates that American broadband performance is well ahead of our friends in Europe," NCTA said. "So notwithstanding the doom and gloom that was on display at the FCC’s meeting last week ... the state of U.S. broadband continues to be extremely strong." Given that, NCTA said, "The FCC’s conclusion that deployment in the U.S. is not reasonable and timely is hard to fathom. It does not seem too much to ask that the FCC take its own factual findings seriously rather than continuing to perpetuate the fiction that American broadband is languishing." The FCC didn't comment.

Hundreds of Verizon employees have spent almost two years getting ready for Super Bowl 50 in the San Francisco Bay area where the carrier says it plans to show off its network. Verizon has built 16 new area cell sites, installed 75 small cells and is deploying a patented antenna system to reach the lower stadium seats at Levi's Stadium, IT said. On Super Bowl weekend, Verizon plans to deploy 14 mobile cell sites in high-traffic locations. Overall, the carrier said it made a $70 million investment in the area to improve its network there before the big game. “We do this because we anticipate that this will be the most ‘shared’ Super Bowl,” said Brian Mecum, vice president-network for Verizon Wireless. “A better wireless network matters when it comes to capturing and sharing life’s greatest moments.” At last year’s Super Bowl, Verizon customers in Phoenix used 4.1 terabytes of data, the carrier said. “A state-of-the-art facility, Levi’s Stadium is designed to handle 1.5 times the wireless data traffic on the Verizon network as compared to University of Phoenix Stadium.” The Super Bowl will be played Feb. 7.

CTIA President Meredith Baker met with FCC officials to express concerns about the agency’s pending 11th broadband progress report and on USF issues. “CTIA highlighted the significant role that mobile wireless broadband services have cemented in the lives of Americans, and expressed disappointment that the Commission’s forthcoming … report may not affirmatively conclude that mobile wireless broadband deployment is occurring on a reasonable and timely basis,” the filing said. Currently, 99 percent of Americas have access to LTE, compared with 35 percent of consumers worldwide, Baker said. Wireless carriers invested a record $32 billion in their networks last year, she said. “American consumers use more than 11.1 billion MB of data every day,” the filing said. “As a result, mobile data usage increased more than 25 percent in 2014 alone, and more than ten times the volume from 2010.” The filing was in docket 15-191. The draft Telecom Act Section 706 report that has been on circulation would find that broadband wasn't being deployed in a timely and reasonable manner to all consumers (see 1601070059).

Eighty-one percent of U.S. households get broadband service, up from 26 percent a decade ago, Leichtman Research Group said in a news release Thursday. LRG said broadband accounts for 97 percent of home Internet service, compared with 91 percent in 2010 and 40 percent in 2005. Overall, 84 percent of U.S. households get home Internet service, and 69 percent of adults go online via a smartphone, it said. Sixty-eight percent of U.S. households get both broadband and pay-TV service, while 13 percent of households get broadband but don't subscribe to TV, LRG said. The data came from a phone survey of 1,223 U.S. households in October, it said.

Cable officials said they had concerns with the FCC's Measuring Broadband America (MBA) program, though overall it "continues to serve the public interest." In a meeting with FCC staffers, including Chief Technologist Scott Jordan, the industry officials noted “periodic failures on the Measurement Lab test server platform” resulting in faulty test results (see 1510150052). They also discussed considerations to apply in possible guidance from Jordan under paragraph 166 of the net neutrality order. “With respect to the requirement that broadband providers disclose actual performance that is 'reasonably related' to the geographic area where the customer purchases service, we reminded the Commission that the MBA program considered reporting results at a regional level but rejected that approach because of the significant expense it would entail,” said the NCTA filing in docket 14-28 on the meeting, which also included officials from Charter Communications, Comcast and Time Warner Cable. “We also explained that individual cable operators generally deploy the same technology and follow the same operational practices across their footprint, so the nationwide results reported by the MBA program should reasonably reflect performance in each geographic area served by a particular operator.” In addition, the cable officials said smaller fixed broadband providers faced challenges complying with a duty to disclose actual performance data. Thousands of providers haven't been included in the program, depriving them of access to the MBA test platform and equipment, NCTA said. “While a handful of larger non-MBA companies have taken it upon themselves to deploy a similar testing regime, any guidance issued by the Commission should reiterate that alternative, less expensive, approaches also are permissible,” the group said. “We also encouraged the Commission to offer additional companies the opportunity to participate in the MBA program, thereby increasing the percentage of broadband consumers that are covered by the program.”

Don't let ISPs "hide poor, inconsistent performance" on broadband "behind methodologies that provide a misleading 'average' performance statistic" in disclosure to customers, Level 3 said in an FCC filing on a meeting with officials. "Consumers should have access to data that tells them, for each provider, whether the provider offers consistent, high-speed performance to Internet broadly, or whether the provider offers inconsistent performance, with better connectivity to some resources than to others." Level 3 used a recent Consumer Advisory Committee proposal (see 1511040030) that consumer ISPs report average download speed, upload speed, latency and packet loss as a starting point for its own plan. For ISPs that can measure performance across their interconnections to other networks, Level 3 recommended "calculating average performance for each destination network, and disclosing the average performance for the destination networks with the best, median, and slowest averages." ISPs also should disclose a "Connectivity Rating" showing if "there is a significant likelihood that performance to some parts of the Internet could become degraded during peak hours because of lack of adequate interconnection capacity," said the backbone provider, which has feuded with ISPs and others over interconnection and other Web issues. Its filing posted Friday in docket 14-28 recounted Assistant General Counsel-Federal Affairs Joseph Cavender’s meeting with FCC Chief Technologist Scott Jordan and a officials from the Wireline and Consumer and Governmental Affairs bureaus.

With so many people in the world seeking broadband access "for information, entertainment and commerce," very few are finding themselves “on the unserved side of the digital device,” EchoStar CEO Michael Dugan said on an earnings call. “We believe over the next 10 to 15 years many of them will require this capability,” Dugan said. “Wireless and fiber infrastructure should be an important part of this transition, so as a company,” EchoStar sees itself as “well-positioned with these technologies,” he said Friday. EchoStar’s “extensive video expertise” recently enabled Dish Network to introduce its Sling TV over-the-top service in the U.S., and “it would be natural for us to leverage this experience and technology platform in other areas of the world,” Dugan said. Monday, Dish, also chaired by Charlie Ergen, reported Q3 results and signaled in the minds of some analysts that it might not participate in the FCC incentive auction (see 1511090015).

Sky has begun connecting its first customers to its new “ultrafast” fiber-to-the-home broadband network in York, U.K., the company said in a Monday announcement. Ultrafast customers will be able to receive broadband speeds of up to 940 Mbps, almost 500 times faster than Sky’s existing “service obligation,” making York the first U.K. city to test ultrafast broadband, it said. “The increased downloads speeds offered by ultrafast broadband mean that customers can download an HD movie in less than 30 seconds.” Sky is the U.K.’s first broadband service provider “to offer guaranteed broadband speeds,” said Lyssa McGowan, director of Sky Broadband, in a statement. “As Ofcom continues its review of the broadband market, we believe that trials like this are a valuable demonstration of the alternative technologies now available,” McGowan said of the U.K. regulator. “With the right conditions for investment and innovation, consumers and businesses could benefit from more ultrafast connections across the UK.”