NTIA Looks to Promote Broadband Access Options

Passed in late 2021 with a strong preference for fiber, those driving the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program have since embraced additional media options, including cable and LEO satellite services. The aim of using these additional services is to cut costs and speed availability times.

The evolution promises states more affordable options for connecting un- and underserved locations for broadband. This could mean quicker deployment of services to branch offices, homes, and small businesses in rural areas, adding them to the broadband economy.

“We expect satellite and other alternative technologies to be part of the mix that states use to connect everyone, especially in areas where the costs to run fiber or other reliable technologies are extremely high,” explained a spokesperson for the National Telecommunications Information Administration (NTIA).

The Emerging Broadband Access Evolution

The association, which administers BEAD, will soon release draft guidance for states that will help them determine how to make those decisions and will ask for public comment on that guidance before finalizing.

Now it appears the NTIA, which administers BEAD, and Elon Musk's SpaceX, which provides its Starlink LEO satellite, are discussing adding the latter's popular service to BEAD as a choice for states. This could extend broadband more affordably to remote rural sites.

SpaceX operates a fleet of low earth orbit satellites that have been providing Internet access services widely via small satellite CPE that can meet the BEAD's speed requirements, an issue years ago when BEAD got underway.

Broadband Access Breakout?

The entry of Starlink into BEAD could extend the list of service providers participating in the broadband access program, according to one industry expert.

Why the evolution in broadband for all? Service providers realized they had to match the media to the potential ARPU. And inflation has driven up the cost of all pieces of the historic broadband undertaking.

“When cable operators, for example, first looked at BEAD, they figured they would be shut out of most of those deployments because of the early preference for fiber,” explained Jeff Heynen, Vice President, Broadband Access and Home Networking at Dell’Oro Group, a global market intelligence firm. "But as time has marched on and deployment costs have increased, they are now likely to get a good share of these builds, either fiber or coax." The same goes for Wireless ISPs (WISP), who thought they would have to overbuild with fiber but now can access lightly licensed Citizens Band Radio Service (CBRS) spectrum to qualify for BEAD FWA deployments, he added.

Heynen claims the States are either communicating directly with Starlink or with operators like T-Mobile and Comcast, who have signed partnerships with Starlink to provide coverage in very rural areas. “The way Starlink is going to expand its role is actually via partnerships with the cable, fiber, and FWA providers.”

Changing Times, Changing Broadband Access Views

States began to realize that their BEAD allocation was not going to address all the required locations using fiber alone. "Each State determined a high-cost threshold for passing and connecting a home with fiber," explained Heynen. "If a home exceeded that threshold, a different technology had to be selected. That is when the States realized that they could not just rely on fiber alone."

To date, the choices have been fiber first and fixed wireless access. This upcoming move provides states with more options, more types of services, and much-needed flexibility in connecting areas without the population needed to justify broadband access.

At heart is broadband affordability. Since the bill was passed in 2021, the price of seemingly everything has increased, making it extra difficult for all parties to determine the best way to provide access or, in a growing number of big cases, default on funding commitments.

Issues making a stable cost and average revenue per user (ARPU) projection harder started with the COVID pandemic, supply chain failures, widespread shortages, and continuing inflation.

Starlink Emergence Impacting Broadband Access Sector

SpaceX continues to refine and enhance its service and supporting devices offering service internationally and via evolved pricing plans and packages for residences and businesses, all while launching additional satellites. A recent report claimed satellite service provider ViaSat lost over half its U.S. subscribers since Starlink's debut. The company reports 257,000 fixed broadband subscribers in the U.S., down from a peak of 603,000 in September 2020. Internationally, China's attempts to launch a fleet of satellites have begun with a major crash.

With earlier geostationary satellites, several high-orbit birds could provide global coverage, albeit from over 22,000 above Earth. Low-Earth orbiting (LEO) satellites are set at about 100 to 1,200 miles above the planet. A LEO can cover about 1/66^th of the globe, which means a large constellation of birds is required for true blanket global coverage. Though they have shorter lifespans, they are more advanced and less expensive.

As a result, today’s LEO satellite networks promise higher-throughput, lower-delay communications that provide more bandwidth per user.