700,000 rural homes to get broadband after FCC auction - Entrepreneur Generations

"More than 700,000 U.S. homes and small businesses in unserved rural America will get broadband internet connectivity as part of a just-completed auction overseen by the Federal Communications Commission. Broadband service to these currently unserved areas in 45 states – the equivalent of as many 1.7 million Americans – will be subsidized in part by about $1.5 billion in federal funds over the next 10 years," Mike Snider reports for USA Today.

The FCC created the reverse auction to encourage providers to build out broadband to underserved areas. In such an auction, bidders that promise to deliver the best service with the least amount of FCC subsidies win the right to build out that region. More than 220 companies put in bids, but since those bids totaled $1.488 billion, far less than the $2 billion the FCC allocated for the program, the extra $500 million in funding will be rolled into future rural connectivity efforts, according to FCC Chair Ajit Pai, Snider reports.

The FCC reports that more than half of the locations to be serviced by auction winners will get download speeds of at least 100 Mbps, about 20 percent will get 1 gig service, and almost all the rest will get at least 25 Mbps, John Eggerton reports for Multichannel News.

For the first time, the FCC allowed electric cooperatives to bid for funding as broadband service providers. Thirty-three electric co-ops took advantage of the shift and partnered to win a $220 million bid for the right to bring broadband to rural areas in their states, Daniel Enoch reports for Agri-Pulse.

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