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United States : ViaSat applauds FCC Action to include new and Innovative Technologies to compete for Connect America Fund; gives rise to new high-speed options for Consumers Nationwide
Publish Date : 30-May-2016
ViaSat Inc, a global broadband services and technology company, is supportive of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decision to make the Connect America Fund (CAF) reverse auction technology neutral and cost-effective by inviting new service providers to participate in the bidding process.
This week, the FCC made an important decision to make $2B available over 10 years to subsidize broadband service availability for many U.S. households in the most remote and hardest-to-serve areas. The Commission took the first step in allowing non-telco service providers with different broadband technologies to compete for the funding. Allowing all technologies to compete through a competitive bidding process can potentially drive down the cost of the program to U.S. consumers. The CAF is focused on modernizing the universal service and intercarrier compensation systems to ensure robust, affordable voice and broadband service, both fixed and mobile, are available to Americans throughout the nation.
"We recognize and applaud Chairman Wheeler, the Commissioners and FCC staff for listening to various stakeholders and potential providers in the Connect America Fund proceeding, and taking an important first step toward expanding beyond legacy technologies and creating a technology neutral competition to provide the best available broadband access universally," said
Mark Dankberg, ViaSat chairman and CEO. "ViaSat stands ready to participate in the proceeding and auction by offering future-ready satellite internet solutions that will help fill the broadband gap in the United States with a high-quality, high-performance broadband and voice service to the target households."
With the FCC's decision, all internet services, including ViaSat's satellite broadband service, Exede, are closer to competing for universal service funds on a level playing field. This will provide the best available high-speed internet access to U.S. households that have been traditionally in the most challenging to serve locations. ViaSat is looking forward to commenting on outstanding issues related to weighting criteria to be used to select competing bids, which will be critical to ensuring that all participating technologies actually compete fairly for funding to deliver the best possible service to everyone. With the addition of satellite broadband, more consumers will have the option for high-quality, high-speed internet access that enables streaming of HD movies and videos as well as music, loading webpages super-quick, video chatting, voice calling, software updates, emailing large files and more - from virtually anywhere in the United States. Today satellite broadband is available with download speeds up to 25 Megabits per second (Mbps), with even higher speeds to be offered in 2017 with the launch of the ViaSat-2 satellite.
