Satellite

Would the combination of AT&T and Time Warner hurt consumers or help them? 

The Trump administration wants to spend $20 billion on a range of risky but potentially “transformative” infrastructure projects, such as satellite networks to provide rural broadband, new launchpads for private rockets, and “augmented reality” technologies to visualize and manage urban traffic congestion. The administration “is already prepared with ideas” for “surgically-targeted” projects, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross told senators as part of a broad, multiagency push for momentum on a 10-year, $200 billion infrastructure proposal facing head winds on Capitol Hill.

satellite internet has been the service of last resort for people who live in places where cable and telco broadband can’t reach. But that may begin to change as a next wave of satellite technology begins entering orbit over the earth over the next few years. The “last alternative” role of satellite service may not last forever, though. Changes are afoot in the industry. These new satellites, called Low Earth Orbit or LEOs, will be smaller and lighter and could soon cost less than $1 million each.

I want to thank the satellite industry for your contributions to our economy and quality of life, which sometimes go underappreciated. I want to express my appreciation for all that you do when disaster strikes. We now stand at a moment of tremendous promise for your industry—and ultimately for
American consumers, who stand to benefit from your efforts. I want the FCC to help you, and with you the public, seize the opportunities that are in front of you. My top priority as Chairman of the FCC is closing the digital divide. I’ve often said that in order

Earlier in 2018, a space startup from Silicon Valley launched four of its first prototype communications satellites on top of an Indian rocket. Except the Federal Communications Commission says that the company didn’t have authorization to send up those spacecraft from the US government. The four satellites reportedly belong to a fledgling company called Swarm Technologies, which was started by former Google and NASA JPL engineer Sara Spangelo in 2016.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai announced that the following items are tentatively on the agenda for the March Open Commission Meeting scheduled for Thursday March 22, 2018:

As Feb 22's SpaceX launch of two test satellites vividly demonstrated, several companies are moving ahead with ambitious plans to design, build, and fly hardware capable of delivering broadband Internet from space. However, as intense as the battle for broadband may be in orbit, the fight is also heating up on the ground. In particular, there is a controversy quietly simmering at the Federal Communications Commission. In a somewhat bizarre situation, the founder and chairman of one company seeking to deliver broadband services, OneWeb, has founded a second company to compete with himself.

SpaceX's worldwide network of thousands of orbiting devices that can beam Internet signals down to earth from low orbit, 5G data, and more efficient use of our airwaves -- all these could boost competition in your local broadband market in the coming years. If it pays off, the result may be faster Internet speeds, better service and lower prices.

To bridge America’s digital divide, we’ll have to use innovative technologies. SpaceX’s application—along with those of other satellite companies seeking licenses or access to the US market for non-geostationary satellite orbit systems—involves one such innovation. Satellite technology can help reach Americans who live in rural or hard-to-serve places where fiber optic cables and cell towers do not reach. And it can offer more competition where terrestrial Internet access is already available.

The UK's Competition and Markets Authority decided that Rupert Murdoch’s £11.7 billion bid to take full control of Sky would concentrate too much power in the media mogul’s hands, giving the Murdoch family “too much control over news providers across all media platforms, and therefore too much influence over public opinion and the political agenda”.  Walt Disney will have to decide whether to take full control of Sky when it completes its proposed $66 billion takeover of the entertainment assets owned by Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox group.