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Tag: "gigabit squared"

The Challenge of Open Access - Lessons Learned Part III

Posted January 22, 2014 by Christopher Mitchell

To finalize our series on reflections from Seattle and Gigabit Squared, I discuss open access networks and how the requirement that a network directly pay all its costs effectively dooms it in the U.S. Read part one here and part two here. I started this series because I felt that the Gigabit Squared failure in Seattle revealed some important truths that can be glossed over in our rush to expand access to fast, affordable, and reliable Internet connections.

The benefits of public-private-partnerships in these networks have often been overstated while the risks and challenges have been understated. We have seen them work and believe communities should continue to seek them where appropriate, but they should not be rushed into because they are less controversial than other solutions.

Sometimes we have to stop and remember that we will live for decades with the choices we make now. It was true when communities starting building their own electrical networks and is still true today. I hope the series has provided some context of how challenging it can be without removing all hope that we can stop Comcast, AT&T, and others from monopolizing our access to the Internet.

In this final piece, I want to turn to a different form of partnership - the open access network. I think it follows naturally as many in Seattle and other large cities would be more likely to invest in publicly owned fiber networks if they did not have to offer services - that being the most competitive, entreprenuerial, and difficult aspect of modern fiber networks.

Chattanooga construction

The desire to focus on long term investments rather than rapidly evolving services is a natural reaction given the historic role of local governments in long term infrastructure investments. Fiber certainly fits in that description and as many have noted, the comparison to roads is apt. An open access fiber network allows many businesses to reach end users just as roads allow Fedex, UPS, and even the Post Office, to compete on a level playing field.

In an open access approach, the local government would build...

Seattle, Gigabit Squared, the Challenge of Private Sector Cable Competition

Posted January 9, 2014 by Christopher Mitchell

This the second in a series of posts exploring lessons learned from the Seattle Gigabit Squared project, which now appears unlikely to be built. The first post is available here and focuses on the benefits massive cable companies already have as well as the limits of conduit and fiber in spurring new competition.

This post focuses on business challenges an entity like Gigabit Squared would face in building the network it envisioned. I am not representing that this is what Gigabit Squared faced but these issues arise with any new provider in that circumstance. I aim to explain why the private sector has not and generally will not provide competition to companies Comcast and Time Warner Cable.

Gigabit Squared planned to deliver voice, television, and Internet access to subscribers. Voice can be a bit of hassle due to the many regulatory requirements and Internet access is comparatively simple. But television, that is a headache. I've been told by some munis that 90% of the problems and difficulties they experience is with television services.

Before you can deliver ESPN, the Family Channel, or Comedy Central, you have to come to agreement with big channel owners like Disney, Viacom, and others. Even massive companies like Comcast have to pay the channel owners more each year despite its over 10 million subscribers, so you can imagine how difficult it can be for a small firm to negotiate these contracts. Some channel owners may only negotiate with a provider after it has a few thousand subscribers - but getting a few thousand subscribers without good content is a challenge.

Many small firms (including most munis) join a buyer cooperative called the National Cable Television Cooperative (NCTC) that has many of the contracts available. But even with that substantial help, building a channel lineup is incredibly difficult and the new competitor will almost certainly be paying more for the same channels as a competitor like Comcast or Time Warner Cable. And some munis, like Lafayette, faced steep barriers in just joining the coop.

(An...

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

Posted January 6, 2014 by Christopher Mitchell

A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines.

There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject.

But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one.

Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far.

The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more.

So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't. The private sector invests for a return and overbuilding Comcast with fiber almost...

Comcast Sets Sights on Seattle Mayor; Payback for Encouraging Competition

Posted November 1, 2013 by Christopher Mitchell

In a reminder of the power embodied in massive corporations like Comcast, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn is facing a challenger buoyed with sizeable contributions from the nation's largest cable and Internet company.

Why is Comcast so interested in defeating Seattle's mayor? Payback and a warning to others. Lest any other big city mayors think it would be wise to help create competition to Comcast's effective monopoly, know that Comcast will finance your opposition.

We have covered Seattle's various attempts at improving Internet access though we have admittedly not written much on its public-private partnership with Gigabit Squared. Gigabit Squared is a new firm that is starting to work with cities that have fiber assets to deliver services to residents and businesses.

The plan in Seattle is to create a large pilot project in at least 12 neighborhoods offering Internet service at speeds far faster than Comcast but at a lower price. Gigabit Squared is using city owned fiber to build its backbone network and working with the City to expand that network.

However, little has happened in the past 10 months since it was announced except some signs that Gigabit Squared was still trying to raise the necessary capital. We understand that some will start to get services early in 2014.

In the meantime, Comcast has donated heavily to Mayor McGinn's rival Ed Murray at a time when many expected the Mayor to already have a challenging race. From the Washington Post story:

Comcast's donations to political action committees (PACs) suggest Comcast has poured dramatically more resources into defeating McGinn. The Broadband Communications Association of Washington PAC, which received 94 percent of its 2013 contributions from Comcast, donated $5,000 to the group People for Ed Murray less than a month after Gigabit Squared's pricing announcement. That was the PAC's largest single donation. Unsurprisingly, People for Ed Murray has made significant expenditures supporting...

Monticello Moves Closer to Settlement with Bondholders

Posted June 20, 2013 by Christopher Mitchell

It has been about a year since we checked in on FiberNet Monticello, a city-owned FTTH network about 40 miles northwest of Minneapolis. At that time, the network was generating insufficient revenue to meet debt payments, the private company operating the network (HBC) was stepping down, and Gigabit Squared was kicking the tires.

Since then, Gigabit Squared and Monticello decided against a partnership and the City ceased making payments to bondholders. Previously, the City had covered the difference between revenues and debt payments by borrowing from the City's liquor store fund, a municipal enterprise fund.

Monticello had financed the network with unbacked revenue bonds, meaning investors understood from the start that the full faith and credit of taxpayers would not "make them whole" in the event that the network did not create the revenues necessary to pay back the bond. Because Monticello chose that financing method, it had to pay a higher interest rate - those who buy bonds understand the differences in risk with different types of bonds and rates.

However, the City has been negotiating with bondholders for a settlement to avoid potential lawsuits over the telecom utility and because this is a typically what how these situations are worked out. Bondholders will "take a haircut" in the parlance of finance rather than risk a total loss.

Last week, Monticello City Council approved a $5.75 million proposed settlement in addition to the remaining funds left in the reserve fund, totaling approximately $8 million from an outstanding bond of $26 million. Final resolution may take many more months, but the major arguments seem to be worked out.

This means that Monticello will own and continue to operate FiberNet Monticello. It also means that rather than having a network financed by revenue bonds, the network will have benefited from City funds from the liquor store and will almost certainly be re-financed with other City funds. Monticello could issue a bond for the new $5.75 million but to my knowledge, no one has suggested that.

Thus far, the impact on...

Blair Levin Discusses Gig.U and More for Community Broadband Bits Episode #37

Posted March 12, 2013 by Christopher Mitchell

Blair Levin is Executive Director of Gig.U. Prior to that, he was in charge of developing the National Broadband Plan and long before that was Chief of Staff for the FCC during the Clinton Presidency. He's had a lot of experience in telecommunications policy but here we focus on what can be done to move America's communities forward.

I asked Blair to join us for the show so I could ask him some hard questions about the Gig.U initiative, including the difficulty of achieving universal service and the tradeoffs around allowing entities not rooted in the community to own (and set the rules for) essential infrastructure. I also challenge Blair's preference for "private sector" investment, asking him what exactly that means.

I hope our discussion is helpful in understanding the tradeoffs communities must make in choosing exactly how to improve Internet access locally. Though Blair and I disagree in some ways, I think we clearly illuminate why we disagree so the listener can make up his/her own mind.

If you have some questions left unanswered or points you wish were made, note them in the comments below and we'll ask him to join us again.

Read the transcript from our discussion here.

We want your feedback and suggestions for the show - please e-mail us or leave a comment below. Also, feel free to suggest other guests, topics, or questions you want us to address.

This show is 35 minutes long and can be played below on this page or subscribe via iTunes or via the tool of your choice using this feed. Search for us in iTunes and leave a positive comment!

Listen to previous episodes here. You can can download this Mp3 file directly from here.

Find more episodes in our podcast index.

Thanks to D. Charles Speer & the...

Gigabit Squared, Monticello, and Next Generation Networks

Posted June 12, 2012 by Christopher Mitchell

For those waking up from a two week nap, the publicly owned FiberNet Monticello recently saw the private provider managing it step down, the City tell Bondholders that it would not make up the difference between revenues and debt payments, and us examining what the network has achieved.

On Monday, the Monticello City Council joined forces with Gigabit Squared a new organization with several experienced network operators on board that previously made news by noting it had $200 million to help build next-generation networks and would likely be working closely with Gig.U.

In a few months, they will take over managing FiberNet Monticello from HBC for a short period of time and may then continue with a longer contract.

One of the benefits of the public owning a network is that when the business plan does not work out as expected, the public still has a strong voice in what happens next. Monticello could have decided to give up on it, but we are glad to see it chose instead to try a new approach. If a private company had owned the network, it alone would have decided how to proceed and its competitors would undoubtedly pay a pretty penny to see it disappear.

Given the anti-competitive actions by incumbents (engaging in predatory pricing and frivolous lawsuits), FiberNet Monticello has to work harder to increase its revenues.

Put simply, they have two choices. 1) Expand. 2) Innovate with new, next-generation services.

From what we could tell, HBC was not particularly interested in either option in Monticello. HBC is a very accomplished triple play company (telephone, Internet access, and television) and does not appear focused on innovating new services. In fact, we have heard one of their likely future public partners saying that they would do triple play and nothing else for years.

...

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