Broadband is a critical component of our nation’s infrastructure system, no doubt about it! As attention continues to grow around infrastructure initiatives, with broadband in the mix, when allocating resources for broadband, we should really ensure that as a nation we are investing in technology that can be readily upgraded to deliver the fastest speeds over the long-term life of the asset being built rather than supporting technologies that may seem cheaper to deploy initially but simply cannot keep pace. At the end of the day, rebuilding a few years later is not effective nor efficient. That is why here at NTCA we are so bullish about the services and performance that #FiberDelivers.
NTCA-The Rural Broadband Association has partnered with our friends at the Fiber Broadband Association to kick off our “Fiber Delivers” campaign, quite fitting during Infrastructure Week out here in our nation’s Capital. We hosted a webinar with some fascinating speakers to provide insights on the value proposition of fiber. Broadband access is a critical infrastructure issue, and ensuring that all Americans have access to fast, reliable internet will have far-reaching positive effects for urban and rural resident alike. Many technologies can enable broadband, but fiber provides the best levels of performance - ultra-fast, symmetrical download and upload speeds and low latency. Fiber delivers education, teleworking and telehealth, precision agriculture and access to news, entertainment, gaming and social platforms. Fiber also delivers economic development and increased home values (check out Brian Whitacre, Professor at Oklahoma State who shared the data with our attendees at our Marketing and Sales Conference today!)
Wednesday’s webinar featured Gary Bolton, CEO of the Fiber Broadband Association, Jim Stegeman, CEO of CostQuest Associates and Ernesto Falcon, Sr. Legislative Counsel at the Electronic Frontier Foundation - all with deep experience in this space and well positioned to share their insights. You can check out the full discussion on YouTube, which focused on the economics of deploying fiber, making the business case for fiber and why it can be more challenging in rural areas, how “sexy” technology like 5G are really fiber fed products and what applications are best served by fiber now and into the future. The energy behind the discussion on how the demand for connectivity, bandwidth and speed will only lead to more innovation and applications in the future. It’s really exciting to think about what has not even been tapped yet in terms of digital inventions and opportunities!
There will be more to follow as policymakers continue their work but as these initiatives get flushed out, it is important to recognize that leveraging experienced providers in the community with a track record of results is important to make sure we can deliver quickly and effectively for consumers who have been sitting in need for far too long. Moreover, any public policy effort is not about creating a science experiment for technologies that don’t yet perform at scale that some claim might meet consumer needs in the future. The billions of dollars potentially in play are not for a venture capital fund to gamble on emerging technology or buying into vendor’s marketing promises. The purpose behind this support is to serve consumers who have been waiting for connectivity. We are simply wasting taxpayer dollars if we have to rebuild networks over again in a few years and that is why we need to AIM HIGHER and DO BETTER. We’re building infrastructure, not paving potholes.
For more #FiberDelivers content, visit NTCA.org/FiberDelivers.
