NTCA Survey: Small Telcos Committed to Wireless Play
Posted by Jesse Ward on Friday, April 16, 2010 · 
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A survey by NTCA reveals that small rural communications providers are investing millions on an ongoing basis to deliver a wireless play to their consumers, and many of those not currently doing so are considering entering the wireless marketplace.
More than three quarters (76%) of respondents to the NTCA 2009 Wireless Survey are providing wireless services to their customers: Sixty-one percent of respondents offer fixed broadband, 54% mobile voice, 32% mobile broadband and 17% fixed voice. In addition, 33% of survey respondents not currently offering wireless service are considering doing so.
Other highlights: Read more
NTCA/RTG Wireless Symposium 2010
Posted by Kevin McGuire on Wednesday, January 13, 2010 · ·
The 2010 NTCA/RTG Wireless Symposium kicked off in rainy (but semi-warm) San Antonio today. With over 300 attendees and 25 exhibitors now registered, it is shaping up to be a great show. We’ll have live updates here on New Edge, and you can also follow us on twitter with the hashtag #ws10. Come back to New Edge and follow us on Twitter to hear updates from the President of International at Clearwire, and nearly 40 other speakers at this event! Visit the conference page to see what you are missing at www.buildwirelessnow.com!
Welcome
Posted by Jesse Ward on Monday, January 11, 2010 · (1) ·
Welcome to the new and improved New Edge, NTCA’s business and technology blog designed specifically for rural telecom professionals. The New Edge is now powered by Word Press and the software enables a variety of new features. The navigation has been improved with the use of tags, categories and related articles. Articles also can be shared, forwarded via e-mail, and discussed via the comment tool.
Subscribers will continue to receive a weekly e-mail, a digest containing the most popular postings from the week, but we also encourage readers to visit www.ntca.org/new-edge and bookmark the site for timely coverage of rural telecom news.
What do you think of the new format and style? We’d love to receive your feedback. Please drop me a line or leave a comment.
NTCA Releases ePaper: The Business Case for Mobile Backhaul
Posted by Jesse Ward on Monday, November 23, 2009 · ·
By 2010 the number of worldwide mobile broadband phone subscribers is expected to pass the 1 Billion mark, and data traffic will surpass voice traffic on mobile networks, this according to a May 2009 release by Infonetics Research. Cisco’s Mobile Forecast supports this projection, reporting that mobile data traffic will increase a thousand-fold over the seven years from 2005 through 2012.
Web surfing, VoIP and multimedia messaging service (MMS) are a few of the bandwidth-hungry services gaining popularity, while early adopters are embracing mobile TV and multimedia content streaming. Read more
Fiber Deployment on Rise in Rural America
Posted by Jesse Ward on Monday, November 23, 2009 · ·
NTCA’s 2009 Broadband/Internet Availability Survey found that 73% of those respondents with a fiber deployment strategy intend to offer fiber to the node to more than 75% of their customers by year-end 2011, while 55% plan to offer fiber to the home to at least half of their customers over the same time frame, up from 26% last year.
Rural areas are seeing significant gains in broadband speeds, primarily due to the increased fiber availability in their communities, according to the survey.
Fifty-three percent of respondents indicated their customers can now receive broadband service of between 3Mbps-6 Mbps (up from 46% last year), and 39% can receive service in excess of 6 Mbps—an increase from just 25% one year ago. Survey respondents indicated an increase in take rates for the higher broadband speed tiers as well. Read more
Follow TelcoTV on Twitter
Posted by Jesse Ward on Monday, November 9, 2009 · ·
The eighth annual TelcoTV Conference & Expo is taking place this week in Orlando, Fl., at the Orange County Convention Center. TelcoTV is the telecom industry’s premier event for the exploration of a comprehensive entertainment convergence strategy.
Rural Youth: Cell Phones are Essential
Posted by Jesse Ward on Monday, October 5, 2009 · ·
The 2009 Rural Youth Telecommunications Survey, conducted jointly by the Foundation for Rural Service (FRS) and NTCA, finds a significant number of today’s young, rural Americans view cellular telephone service as more essential than traditional landline telephone service, and the group views cell phones as a device capable of much more than voice calls.
Nearly nine out of ten respondents indicated they have a cell phone. Ninety percent of respondents use cell phones for purposes other than making voice calls. The majority use their phones for text messaging (72%) and picture taking (50%).
The annual survey also explored wireless, Internet and video usage habits of rural youth. Read more