Broadband for the rest of us

Efforts continue to broaden broadband’s reach in the U.S. across all demographics and income levels. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler and Commissioner Mignon Clyburn proposed that Lifeline subsidies for low income consumers be broadened to include payments for broadband access and bundled packages to keep up with evolving communications technology.

Not to be outdone, President Obama announced a new initiative aimed at providing broadband access to 20 million more Americans by 2020, including the proposal by the FCC to provide a broadband subsidy for poor households.

Meanwhile, AT&T announced it's now offering GigaPower broadband service in Chicago, Miami, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio, making GigaPower available in 20 of the nation's largest metros. The company said it plans to expand in 36 additional metro areas -- totaling at least 56 metros served.

Broadband is now extending beyond dry land to provide faster service to all the ships at sea. Panasonic Avionics has announced it will be offering broadband connectivity and digital entertainment services to passenger vessels across the maritime market utilizing a high-availability Ku-band satellite network. 

Latin America is heating up

While telenovelas may be hot on Latin American television, mobile is where things are happening. Consumer marketing analyst GfK released a study indicating the explosive growth of mobile device use in Latin America is adding mobile media time to traditional TV time spent, not cutting into it. Use of mobile media devices in Latin America is rapidly rising, accounting for over 19 hours weekly – nearly one-third of total media time. The results come from the latest in a series of GfK single-source cross-media studies prepared for ESPN. 

The big news, though, is Cuba, where Verizon Communications has reached an agreement with telecom monopoly Etecsa to provide direct interconnection voice service to the Communist island nation once implementation and testing is completed.

Telefonica continues to make news in Latin America, where it is deploying a submarine cable between Brazil, Puerto Rico, and the mainland U.S. to increase video data transmission capacity via ultra-fast broadband.

Broadband service continues to expand in Central America, with nationwide 4G LTE coming to Belize this year. Belize Telemedia Limited has announced its partnership with Huawei Technologies to roll out a nationwide 4G LTE network this December under the DigiCell Mobile brand.

Mobile Asia

China’s jaw-dropping mobile expansion continues. The world's largest international mobile virtual network enabler (MVNE), Plintron, announced a major Asia Pacific expansion plan focused on China's mobile market, which has grown 10X in just the last year. Since mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) licenses were first awarded just two years ago, the Chinese MVNO market has grown exponentially, from just 2 million subscribers to 20 million customers last year.

Nearby in Thailand, Ericsson has been selected by leading Thai mobile operator TrueMove H to deploy LTE-Advanced, expand 4G/3G, and build GSM networks in that country. Ericsson has signed a three-year frame contract with True Move H, a subsidiary of True Corporation Plc under the True Mobile Group, to enhance further rollout of LTE-Advanced Carrier Aggregation and 2G/3G networks on 900/1800/2100MHz spectrum in North, Central West, and South Thailand.

Wireless safety and security

As our world grows increasingly wireless, safety and security continue to be major concerns for humans and machines. A new study released by Nokia reveals that smartphones now account for 60 percent of malware activity observed in mobile networks, pulling ahead of Windows-based computers and laptops.

AT&T launched an enhanced multimedia 9-1-1 solution to help emergency management agencies upgrade their older 9-1-1 networks to IP technology that supports text, photos, and video in addition to voice service. The new service is designed to accelerate the adoption of Next Generation 9-1-1 call routing and meets the latest National Emergency Number Association (NENA) i3 standards. Agencies can more easily manage 9-1-1 calls and automatically handle call overflow. First responders such as law enforcement agencies, fire departments, and Emergency Medical Services (EMS), will now be able to receive detailed information more quickly.