COVID-19: Recommendations for Broadband & Telecom Providers These are unusual times, as COVID-19 has disrupted daily life and business operations across the country. In doing so, the current pandemic has highlighted the need for reliable, robust, fully supported broadband networks. Vantage Point offers the following recommendations and best practices for maintaining and supporting your networks … Read more
FCC’s Supply Chain Data Collection All Universal Service Fund (USF) recipients that were eligible telecommunications carriers (ETCs) as of December 31, 2019, must respond to the mandatory Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Supply Chain Data Collection (Data Collection) due no later than April 22, 2020. Other USF and service providers that are not ETCs are also … Read more
Two industry leaders combine nearly 70 years of experience, more than 350 staff, and 7 office locations. Vantage Point Solutions and GVNW Consulting are pleased to announce their merger. The two companies combine nearly 70 years of experience, more than 350 staff, and 7 office locations. “GVNW’s leadership and experience has been an asset to … Read more
Feb. 7, 2020: FCC Releases RDOF Order The FCC has just released the Report and Order previously approved at the January 30 open meeting; the full document is linked here. The Vantage Point Consulting and Engineering teams are actively reviewing this Order for any significant changes, surprises, or declarations. If you wish to receive a … Read more
RDOF: What’s Happening Now? Vantage Point has fielded several inquiries about the status of RDOF since the FCC’s January 30 meeting. Here we are providing an update about what is happening now, what to expect next, and what steps you can be taking at this time. What’s happening now Last week the FCC voted to … Read more
Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) & Copyright Infringement On December 19, 2019, a jury awarded Sony $1 billion in damages against Cox Communications after ruling that Cox failed to protect its network against copyright infringement by the ISP’s subscribers. Generally, ISPs are allowed safe harbor under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). However, an earlier … Read more
Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) is now Commercially Available On January 27, 2020, the FCC released its Public Notice, DA 20-110, in which the FCC has announced the completion of initial Commercial Deployment (ICD) phase and the approval of the Spectrum Access System (SAS) services of CommScope, Federated Wireless, Google, and Sony for Commercial Operations. … Read more
FCC Adds Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) to January Agenda On January 8th, 2020, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) issued a News Release announcing the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF), which would provide $20.4 billion in high-cost universal service support over 10 years, has been added to the January 30th Open Commission meeting. The Report … Read more
Geolocation data for locations built in 2019 are due on March 2. This deadline applies to companies with these funding obligations: You may be missing locations Carriers who may have already collected location information through a process other than in the field geocoding may be missing some locations. For example, some automated geocoding processes lack the … Read more
Bureau Establishes an Eligible Locations Adjustment Process (ELAP) On November 12, 2019, the Wireline Competition Bureau (WCB) released an order creating a voluntary process to review the defined deployment obligations (locations and associated support) on a state-by-state basis when the total number of actual locations in the eligible areas is less than the number of … Read more
Lifeline New Low-Income Program Rules The Lifeline program was originally established in 1985 to ensure that low -income consumers had access to affordable, landline telephone service. Today, the Lifeline program provides qualifying low-income consumers discounts on voice or broadband Internet access service, as well as in a bundled service. Currently, qualifying low-income consumers receive a … Read more
Disaster Recovery Planning From blizzards and flooding to wildfires and hurricanes, 2019 has been a year of weather extremes across the United States. Each season brings new challenges and new opportunities. One challenge we hope you have not had to deal with is the occurrence of a natural disaster in your area. We want to … Read more
Court Upholds Majority of Restoring Internet Freedom Order On October 1, 2019, in the case of Mozilla Corporation v. Federal Communications Commission et al., the U.S. Court of Appeals (“the Court”) confirmed a majority of the FCC rule changes included in the 2017 Restoring Internet Freedom Order (“RIF Order”) which overturned the prior FCC’s 2015 … Read more
USDA Releases Details on the 2nd Round of ReConnect The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has released the highly anticipated details for the second round of funding for the ReConnect Program. The ReConnect Program will provide up to $512M in loan and grant funding to assist with building broadband infrastructure in rural areas of … Read more
Order on Reconsideration to be considered on October 25th Open Commission Meeting On October 4, 2019, the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) issued an Order on Reconsideration regarding Measuring CAF Recipients’ Broadband Performance (the requirement commonly referred to as “CAF Performance Testing” or “Performance Testing”) that clarifies and modifies certain portions and parameters of the Performance … Read more
Connect America Fund – Report and Order, FNPRM and Order on Reconsideration – WC Docket 10-90 The Federal Communications Commission (“Commission”) has released for circulation a draft Report and Order, Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order on Reconsideration on the Connect America Fund (“FCC November 2018 Draft Order and NPRM”) in response to the … Read more
Attention: WY – 700 MHz Lower Band (Blocks A, B, and E) License Holders and WZ – 700 MHz Lower Band (Blocks C and D) License Holders The End of License Term Construction deadlines for both WY and WZ license holders are coming due in June of 2019. Please note also that leased spectrum may have license … Read more
On July 7, the FCC released a Report and Order eliminating several reporting requirements of the annual FCC Form 481 that it deems to be either duplicative of other reporting requirements or are simply no longer necessary. The requirements eliminated were: These eliminations are schedule to be effective immediately following approval by the Office of … Read more
On a national committee to expand broadband access, Larry Thompson will represent the little guy. But that’s not to say Mitchell-based Vantage Point Solutions (VPS) is little. With approximately 200 employees and an international footprint, the telecom and broadband consulting engineering firm helped Mitchell become one of the world’s top seven Intelligent Communities in 2015, … Read more
