AT&T CEO John Stankey said Monday the carrier will move aggressively to shutter more of its legacy copper network in coming months, filing applications at the FCC to stop selling legacy products in about 1,300 wire centers. That is about a quarter of AT&T’s footprint, officials said on a call discussing Q4 results. AT&T also announced that its growth is continuing, with 482,000 postpaid phone subscription net adds in the quarter and 307,000 AT&T Fiber adds.
It is critical that more licensed spectrum becomes available for the wireless industry, Rhonda Johnson, AT&T executive vice president-federal regulatory relations, said Wednesday. “The U.S. has no supply of the licensed spectrum that fuels wireless services, and the FCC has no authority to auction the essential resource,” Johnson wrote in a blog post: “This spectrum drought has allowed other countries, including China, to surpass the U.S. in allocating key portions of spectrum.” Expanding AT&T’s network “requires expanding access to the licensed spectrum that powers it,” she said. AT&T arguably has been the most outspoken national wireless carrier in projecting positive things to come from Donald Trump's incoming administration (see 2412100069). Johnson also stressed the importance of regulators clearing a path for the provider to shutter inefficient copper networks (see 2405210059). “Outdated regulations force U.S. telecom companies to maintain inefficient copper networks, diverting investment from the resilient high-speed internet technologies of the future.”
AT&T said Monday the FCC approved its proposal to to initially stop new sales and then discontinue residential local service in nine Oklahoma wire centers. The proposal was deemed granted Saturday after the agency didn’t take further action. The Communications Workers of America slammed the development.
AT&T CEO John Stankey anticipates a pro-growth administration and FCC with the inauguration of Donald Trump in January. During a UBS financial conference Tuesday, Stankey noted a “pro-investment dynamic” in Trump’s first term. Cutting taxes “worked” and led AT&T to make record investments in its network. Stankey said he knows Brendan Carr, tapped to lead the FCC next year, and expects him to be aggressive on making more spectrum available for carriers and on other issues important to AT&T. “He believes markets solve a lot of problems,” Stankey said of Carr: “Certainly, he's fairly public with his point of view.” AT&T plans accelerating its push to replace copper lines with updated technology, he said. “We've been working on filing in certain wire centers to show that we can move completely off of legacy technology and meet the needs of customers with newer technologies.” He added, “I'm comfortable we're moving into this at the right time.” The current FCC hasn’t opposed to the transition, “they've just been cautious,” Stankey said. Chris Sambar, a former AT&T executive, said in May the company spends $10 billion annually maintaining millions of miles of copper wires, of which only 5% remain in use (see 2405210059).
Telecom companies balked at consumer advocates’ call to apply California carrier of last resort (COLR) obligations to broadband. The California Public Utilities Commission posted reply comments Thursday in a rulemaking about how to update the state’s 30-year-old COLR rules (docket R.24-06-012). In initial comments last month, carriers subject to COLR requirements asked that the CPUC shed those obligations in many parts of the state, while consumer advocates said COLR obligations remain necessary and should be updated to include high-speed internet service, not just voice (see 2410020037). Frontier Communications replied Wednesday that it opposes expanding the proceeding to do “a complex, controversial evaluation of legal and policy matters pertaining to the Commission’s potential regulation of broadband services.” Likewise, Consolidated Communications said the CPUC should "decline the invitation to undertake a substantial review of its regulatory jurisdiction over broadband services.” TDS protested that the consumer groups "seek to greatly expand this OIR beyond its intended purpose” without providing factual or legal reasons. Don’t let public advocates "transform this … into a generic telecommunications industry reexamination docket,” said a coalition of small rural local exchange carriers. Representing cable companies, the California Broadband and Video Association warned that adding broadband to the definition of a basic service or extending COLR obligations to broadband providers would be federally preempted. Meanwhile, the CPUC’s independent Public Advocates Office pushed back on companies that said COLR obligations are outdated and should be eliminated. "In reality, the COLR concept remains essential to the guarantee of universal service, but must be updated to reflect the state’s transformed telecommunications landscape,” PAO said. AT&T disagreed. "Maintaining COLR obligations where they are superfluous would divert resources from vital broadband investments to outdated [time division multiplexed] networks, which are increasingly unwanted by consumers,” the carrier said. “It would not only stifle competition by arbitrarily constraining ILECs alone but also result in unnecessary operational costs and increased environmental harm due to prolonged use of copper networks.”
The Arizona Corporation Commission should pull back regulations on Frontier Communications while eliminating Arizona Universal Service Fund (AUSF) subsidies for the wireline carrier, Frontier and commission staff argued at a livestreamed hearing Monday. Meanwhile in Connecticut, Frontier pushed back against a proposed $2.48 million fine for missing certain state service-quality metrics.
California should shed carrier of last resort (COLR) obligations in many parts of the state, carriers that are subject to those regulations said in comments posted this week at the California Public Utilities Commission. Just don’t extend the rules to other kinds of companies, warned a cable broadband association, whose members are free from such regulations. However, consumer advocates said COLR obligations remain necessary and should be updated to include high-speed internet service, not just voice.
Verizon faced tough cross-examination Friday as consumer advocates hammered the company’s petition for Connecticut deregulation. Paul Vasington, the carrier's senior director-regulatory and government affairs, said during a Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA) virtual hearing that the market where the ILEC seeks deregulation has reached “full potential” competitively given many VoIP and wireless options. However, officials from the Connecticut Office of Consumer Counsel (OCC) questioned whether Verizon competitors offer services that are the functional equivalent of landlines.
CTIA presented a 109-page argument against California regulating wireless service quality. Comments were posted through Tuesday at the California Public Utilities Commission. The commission is weighing a staff proposal that moves away from the CPUC’s light-touch approach to wireless and interconnected VoIP. While industry widely panned the plan and hinted at lawsuits, public advocates said expanding regulation of newer voice services is a must.
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- A California rulemaking on modernizing carrier of last resort rules could inspire similar proceedings elsewhere, state and industry officials signaled at the NARUC conference Monday. The California Public Utilities Commission last month opened a rulemaking that took a fresh look at COLR rules after rejecting regulatory relief for AT&T (see 2406200065).