Infrastructure Funds Must Go to Those That Build Sustainable Networks: Verizon
A Verizon executive warned against awarding funds from the NTIA’s $48 billion broadband, equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program to companies that won’t be able to build the networks they promise. BEAD must be “structured in a way that works for experienced providers, who cannot only build reliable and efficient networks, but who will be around to serve customers for many years to come,” said Kathleen Grillo, senior vice president-public policy and government affairs, at a Media Institute virtual lunch Wednesday.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
“No one benefits if funding goes to companies that won’t be around in five years, or who have never really built networks to scale,” Grillo said. “That’s just not a good use of taxpayer money,” she said: “Building networks is technical, complicated work. If it were easier more Americans would be connected. … We have one shot to get this right.”
Grillo said the rules also shouldn’t discourage companies like Verizon from seeking BEAD funds. Requirements to offer “special one-off services or specific pricing in a particular area or open-access rules … may discourage companies from signing up,” she said.
Analysts “scoffed” in 2003 when Verizon launched Fios, suggesting the capital costs would be too high and the company didn’t have the network traffic to justify the investment, Grillo said. “Our bet, and our continued investment in Fios, is one of the smartest bets in the history of our industry,” she said. With 5G fixed-wireless access (FWA) Verizon is “investing in a new technology that is shaking up the broadband industry yet again,” she said.
Grillo also said Verizon plans to use fixed wireless to compete with cable providers nationwide. Some cable operators downplay the challenge from FWA (see 2208100015).
With Fios, Verizon has been competing with cable in just 10 states, its old ILEC footprint, Grillo said. With its C-band spectrum Verizon “can compete just as aggressively with cable, head-to-head, all across the country,” she said. Fixed wireless is soon expected to be 15% of all broadband connections, according to Ericsson, she said: FWA is “a powerful new competitor in the broadband market. It’s going to provide new choices for consumers and increase competition.”
C Band
The C-band build is the most aggressive Verizon has ever done, Grillo said. “We’re on track to hit most of our targets; we’re actually ahead of most of them,” she said, though the dispute with the airlines over deployment “was not ideal from anyone’s perspective.” Verizon and AT&T agreed in June to delay turning on the band around a limited number of airports for a year or longer (see 2206170070).
Grillo also urged Congress to approve comprehensive, national privacy legislation “now, and not assume that we can just kick the can down the road again.” The internet doesn’t “stop at state lines, and neither should consumer privacy protections,” she said: “We need one national standard.” Verizon favors putting the FTC in charge of privacy, she said.
At a Fierce Telecom digital event Wednesday, speakers noted the growing importance of FWA to reaching many customers in hard-to-serve areas. The BEAD program will “help us bridge the digital divide over the next decade,” said Clint Odom, T-Mobile vice president-strategic alliances and external affairs. “We want to see broadband everywhere, in urban and rural areas, and we must ensure that money is invested in smart and equitable ways.”
Odom said fixed wireless offerings like T-Mobile’s home internet product will be part of the equation. The service is now available to 40 million POPs in the U.S. in about 40 states, he said, noting he was appearing on the webinar via the service. “We’re currently on track to have 7 to 8 million customers by 2026,” he said. “We really do believe that fixed wireless, although not the ultimate solution, is certainly a solution that can be deployed especially in rural America, in a cost-effective way, in an efficient way,” he said.
Rural areas continue to have to rely on copper lines, some decades old, to access the internet, said Beth Cohen, Verizon cloud product technologist. Fixed wireless “is really building on what we did 90 years ago when we brought the telecommunications technology out to the rural areas,” she said.
C-band signals have a large coverage area because of the propagation characteristics and offer wide bandwidth, Cohen said. The band offers coverage “that makes the most sense in rural areas,” she said. “5G just delivers more bandwidth, and it’s more efficient,” she said: “That gives you the ability to deliver more services out of that tower to more people.”