CenturyLink puts the joint back into its venture with Level 3

7 August 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Someone at CenturyLink – or maybe Level 3 Communications – finally inhaled deeply, exhaled fully and chanted California’s national mantra: go with the flow, go with the flow. In its latest filing with the California Public Utilities Commission, CenturyLink finally admitted that the September deadline for closing its deal to buy Level 3 that it’s been puffing and huffing about, I’m sorry, huffing and puffing about isn’t a deadline at all.

Since the purchase agreement was announced last October, CenturyLink has been trying to jam it through the necessary regulatory reviews by wailing about a phoney, self-imposed deadline and falsely claiming that the deal won’t hurt competition in what passes for a broadband market in California.… More

Bitcoin's disruption is the healthy and rewarding result of a free market

6 August 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are different from other software and standards-based platforms. There are no governing authorities or dominant players or established industry groups. That’s deliberate. The whole point is to create a way of exchanging value that’s not centrally regulated by governments or private organisations. But that means a super-majority of the millions of individual users have to accept and adopt software updates, or else there’s the risk that Bitcoin will splinter into different versions with different values.… More

Cryptocurrencies' crowd source incentives prevent collapse into one crowd

5 August 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

The disruption in cryptocurrency markets this week, when Bitcoin sorta split into two, was the result of disagreements between different interests about the technology and crowd-sourced methods used to run it. It was also inevitable and purposeful – cryptocurrencies are intended to rise and fall according to the cumulative decisions of millions – eventually, billions – of sovereign, individual users, who won’t always agree with each other.

Bitcoin’s underlying software can’t keep up with the growing number and speed of transactions between its users.… More

FCC is finally playing with a full deck

4 August 2017 by Steve Blum
, ,

It was bipartisanship, of a sort, when the U.S. senate confirmed Jessica Rosenworcel and Brendan Carr as FCC commissioners yesterday. Senate democrats wanted to score some points and republicans were in a mood to let them do it – never underestimate the motivational power of an imminent summer vacation.

It was the product of complicated – and completely typical – Beltway horse trading. The bottom line, though, is that the Federal Communications Commission is back up to its full strength of five members with three republicans and two democrats – the privilege of the majority goes to the party that has a president in the white house.… More

More wireless broadband spectrum auctions proposed in U.S. senate

3 August 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

A second bill aimed at freeing up more wireless spectrum for broadband service is floating in the U.S. senate. Tagged the Airwaves act, it would set deadlines for the Federal Communications Commission to auction off several bands and other federal agencies to give up ownership of several more. It would also set aside 10% of the auction proceeds for wireless broadband infrastructure in poorly served rural areas.

It was introduced earlier this week by a bipartisan pair of senators – Maggie Hassan (D – New Hampshire) and Cory Gardner (R – Colorado) – and immediately praised by wireless industry lobbyists and FCC commissioners alike.… More

Federal court says cable and telcos can pay the same rate for pole access

2 August 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

Federal law does not require telephone companies to be treated differently from cable companies, when it comes to attaching cables to utility poles. That’s the ruling of a federal appeals court (h/t to Omar Masry at the City and County of San Francisco for the pointer). It rejected a challenge from electric utilities to a 2015 decision by the Federal Communications Commission that equalised the standard charge for utility pole access, and trimmed back an irrelevant distinction.… More

$20 million still available for California broadband subsidies

1 August 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

There’s about $20 million, plus or minus, left for broadband infrastructure grants in the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF), against pending proposals totalling $5.7 million. That’s without taking into account a possible top-up that’s under consideration in the California legislature, but which might also make spending it on anything other than minimal upgrades by Frontier Communications or AT&T virtually impossible.

Over the years, the California legislature has pumped $315 million into the kitty, with $270 million of that allocated to construction subsidies for broadband systems – middle and last mile – in areas that are either completely unserved or lack service at a minimum of 6 Mbps download and 1.5 Mbps upload speeds.… More

CenturyLink tones down deadline threat to CPUC

31 July 2017 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Okay, maybe not high noon. But can we say twelve-ish?

When CenturyLink and Level 3 Communications signed their marriage license, they set an 11 month time limit to take their vows. That’s common enough in major transactions – setting closing dates makes it easier to structure financial packages and it keeps everyone focused on getting it done. But blowing past such deadlines is not uncommon either, and coming to agreement on extensions is a relatively straightforward process, if the companies involved still want to make it happen.… More

Legacy telcos chalk up historically bad financial results


Forward looking statement.

It’s hard times for legacy telephone companies, at least the sort that have to rely on wireline – mostly copper – systems to serve customers. The plummeting share prices of Frontier Communications, CenturyLink and Windstream have gone where no telco has gone before. According to a story by Sean Buckley in FierceTelecom, that’s the conclusion of financial analysts at Cowen…

“Shares in the wireline [incumbent/rural carrier] space (CenturyLink, Frontier, Windstream) have endured the worst three consecutive quarters in industry history, with shares plummeting an average of -20% in 4Q16, -21% in 1Q17, and -24% in 2Q17 (we note another -5% in 3Q17 thus far), mostly from Frontier and Windstream as CenturyLink shares are being supported by the Level 3 acquisition,” Cowen said in a research note…

Overall, the three companies face the industry-wide challenge of balancing strategic service growth with ongoing legacy service declines and losing market share to cable operators.

… More

Cable industry prepares for open competition in IoT services

29 July 2017 by Steve Blum
, , , ,


Click for the full picture.

Open source and cable industry are terms seldom found in the same sentence. But that’s about to change and it might be a very big deal indeed. CableLabs is the jointly funded, common technical development organisation for the cable industry, worldwide. Its crown jewel is the twenty year old DOCSIS standard, which is the engine that drives data delivery over hybrid fiber-coax systems in the U.S., and most of the the rest of the world.… More