2021.08.06 – Open Broadband News

They’re rolling in! More than 4 million US households enrolled in broadband plan

FCC Acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel announced over four million households have enrolled in the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program, the nation’s largest broadband affordability program to date. The $3.2 billion subsidy program initiated by Congress provides a temporary $50 to $75 discount on eligible households’ Internet bills during the duration of the pandemic.

“We knew from the beginning that the success of the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program would largely depend on mobilizing trusted on-the-ground advocates and community leaders. With more than four million enrolled households in less than three months, I say we’re on the right track,” said Rosenworcel. “We’ve made terrific progress, but the FCC remains committed to building on this initial momentum so we can connect as many families as possible and help those struggling to get online.”

Since the program’s inception, the FCC has found creative ways to increase awareness and educate consumers, providers, advocates, and more about this program. In addition to extensive press engagement, agency staff have conducted more than 320 virtual public presentations, ranging from smaller localized events for community groups and libraries to larger train the trainer style events with national non-profit organizations.

UK government powers full steam ahead with Project Gigabit plans

The UK government has provided an update on its Project Gigabit initiative to ensure that very high-speed fixed broadband connections are available to most people in “hard-to-reach areas” by detailing the rollout plans for 26 counties across England.

The government says an additional 1.85 million premises will have access to Gigabit broadband by 2025 as a result of the Project, which has a headline investment figure of £5 billion attached to it but for which a vast majority of the funding has not been guaranteed.

The contracts for the state-funded fiber access network rollouts will be awarded in phases, with “almost half a million (480,000) premises in Shropshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Worcestershire, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight will be among the first to benefit followed by counties including Derbyshire, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Lancashire, Surrey, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, Nottinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Staffordshire, Lincolnshire and Yorkshire.”

Goodbye DSL! Fiber overtakes as the most subscribed in OCED countries

High-speed fiber Internet subscriptions surpassed copper-wire DSL connections across OECD countries for the first time in 2020 as the need to move work and home life activities online during the COVID-19 pandemic led to a record 21.15 million new fixed broadband connections (including fiber, DSL, cable and others) in the year to end-December 2020.

The latest update to the OECD broadband portal shows that fiber now exceeds 30% of fixed broadband subscriptions across the OECD’s 38 member countries, up from 12% a decade ago, and is by far the fastest growing broadband technology, with subscriptions up 14% in 2020 from 2019, outpacing a 5% rise in overall fixed broadband subscriptions.

While cable remains the predominant fixed broadband technology, accounting for 34% of subscriptions across OECD countries with a rise of 5.6% in 2020, fiber is steadily replacing DSL subscriptions, which have dropped by 10% over the past two years.

Australian cloud spending to reach $13.8bn in 2021

Australian spending on cloud services is on track to reach $13.8 billion in 2021, before growing a further 23.4% next year to $16.7 billion, according to Gartner.

The research firm predicts that the Australian market will outperform the global average next year as companies continue to increase their cloud spending. Gartner projects that global public cloud spending will exceed 45% of all enterprise IT spending, up from less than 17% in 2021.

This growth is being driven by key trends including the growing cloud ubiquity and new advances in wireless communications technology, according to Gartner VP Analyst Michael Warrilow.

“Multiple emerging technologies will enable Australia to overcome the tyranny of distance in coming years. Distributed cloud and broadband low-Earth-orbit satellite technology are just two examples that will unify Australians,” Warrilow said.

Three ways to boost fixed broadband access in Latin America

The COVID-19 crisis has hit the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region harder than any other region in the world and brought the need for a resilient and inclusive recovery into sharp focus. But the challenges are substantial: Poor and uneven coverage, coupled with high data and device costs, continues to hamper digital access. Today, less than half of LAC’s population has fixed broadband connectivity, and only 9.9% has high-quality fiber connectivity at home.

Tackling the digital divide is imperative and will require policy actions to reduce cost, expand access and incentivize greater private-sector and citizen participation, especially in three areas:

1.      Government regulation – LAC governments should pursue inclusion through service provision and legal and regulatory reform.

2.      Fiscal incentives – Policymakers should consider direct or indirect financial incentives for both digital customers and operators as appropriate. On the demand side, subsidizing Internet costs for the poorest, and reducing taxes and customs duties on low-cost, Internet-capable devices can help bring down prices that exclude the poor.

3.      Digital skills – Digital expansion should not operate in a connectivity silo. Complementary measures, such as digital skills training, need to be accelerated. Only 5-15% of adults in most LAC countries have medium or strong computer and problem‑solving skills in technology‑rich environments (vs. 29.7% in OECD countries).